SCAELET GEEANIUM. 



Pelargonium zonule. 



T is to be hoped no savage botanist 

 will behold this page^ for it is a 

 great sin against botanical jjro- 

 priety to label the flower before 

 us " geranium/-" for a true gera- 

 nium is something very different. 

 All the showy plants of this 

 class that are so highly prized 

 in gardens are pelargoniums, or 

 stork's-bills, the seed-vessels just 

 before they begin to separate 

 bearing some resemblance to the 

 bill of a stork. The pelargoniums 

 are, for the most part, natives of 

 the Cape of Good Hope. They 

 are shrubby in habit, but never 

 attain to the dignity of trees, 

 and they are distinguished by 

 the irregularity of their flowers, 

 the petals of which are never, or 

 but rarely, of equal size throughout. The geraniums are 

 mostly herbs of Europe, and a certain few of their number 

 are conspicuous amongst the wild flowers of Britain, the 

 meny little herb Robert of the mountains {Geraaiam 



