200 FLOWERS OF GARDEN AND GREENHOUSE 
racemes. Calyx five-parted; corolla - tube cylindric or urn -shaped, 
rounded or five-angled, lobes five. Stamens ten : carpels five, with thread- 
like styles. Fruit a many-seeded follicle. The species are distributed 
throughout the West and South of Europe, the whole of Africa, Mexico, 
and temperate Asia. 
The plants now brought together by botanists into the 
genus Cotyledon were formerly separated into the genera 
Cotyledon, Echeveria, Pachyphytum, Pistorinia, and Umbilicus. The 
remembrance of this fact may obviate some confusion. One solitary 
species is indigenous—Cotyledon umbilicus, the Navelwort, confined 
chiefly to the Western coasts. Among the earliest of the foreign species 
to be introduced was C. orbiculata, two hundred years ago, from the 
Cape, whence also came C. hemispherica in 1731, and C. fascicularis in 
1759. Four years before the beginning of this century C. cwspitosa was 
introduced from California; whilst the well-known C. gibbiflora (1826), 
C. seewnda (1837), and C. retusa (1846) all came from Mexico. There 
are numerous hybrids in cultivation. 
COTYLEDON AGAVOIDES (Agave-like).. Flowering stem 
slender, 8 to 12 inches high. Leaves ovate, narrowed to a 
spiny point, glaucous, forming rosettes. Flowers orange, few. Native 
of Mexico. 
C. ATROPURPUREA (dark purple). Stem stout, short, with leaves 
forming an Aloe-like rosette at its summit. Leaves egg-shaped, dark 
purple, with a “bloom” upon them. Flower-stem erect, bearing a long 
raceme of five-sided bright purplish-red flowers, white towards the 
base. Introduced from Mexico (1869). 
C. FULGENS (shining). Stem 4 to 6 inches high, with leafy flowering 
branches, 12 to 18 inches long. Leaves egg-shaped, pale glaucous, in a 
thin rosette. Flowers wax-like, coral red, with yellow base; in panicled 
_ Tacemes. Native of Mexico. 
eo. C. GIBBIFLORA (humped flowers). Stems branched, 1 to 2 feet high. 
Leaves wedge-shaped, ending in a sharp hard point ; crowded at tops of 
branches, Flowers, white at base, scarlet towards the tips of the humped 
ae Spe Seen along the spreading branches of the panicle; 
lento, eens var. metallica has metallic-looking, purple- 
foal weg “i =i — across. The flowers are yellowish, 
"many garden varieties ng med, many-flowered panicle. There are 
rmisk ae (large - flowered). Stems 1 to 2 feet. Leaves — 
~ > Weege-shaped ; white or glaucous; lower ones forming a 
History. 
PrincipalSpecies. 
