148 SUB-ALPINE PLANTS 



dilated into a sub-orbicular limb or rounded, spoon-shaped apex, 

 coriaceous and rugged in texture, encrusted at the margins with 

 lime. Stem-leaves narrowly oboval, very small and slightly glandu- 

 lar. Flowers milk-white. Petals obovate, wedge-shaped. Calyx 

 glandular with obtuse lobes. 



Sub-alpine limestone rocks in the French and Italian Maritime 

 Alps, particularly about the Tenda road, and also abundantly on 

 some of the adjoining mountains of Liguria further east, where it 

 descends to about 1300 feet at Buggio in the Nervia Valley, and 

 ascends to 5500 feet. Endemic in this district. June, July. 



Saxifraga crustata Vest. 



Stem 2-4 inches high, erect, racemose above, glandular-hairy, 

 branches naked, few-flowered at the head of the stems. Rosette- 

 leaves broadly linear, obtuse, entire, the cartilaginous margin 

 strongly encrusted. Petals white, obtuse, obovate or wedge-shaped. 



High calcareous Alps, but descending below the Alpine region 

 as, e.g. in the deep and narrow valley at Weitenstein ; 3000-7200 

 feet. June to August. 



Distribution. — Carpathians, Tyrol to Carinthia. 



Saxifraga ccBsia L. 



A small grey species, a few inches high, with cylindrical tufts of 

 densely imbricate leaves. Stem ascending from a hemispherical 

 rosette of leaves, and bearing a 1-6 flowered corymbose cyme. 

 Stem-leaves and calyx glabrous and glaucous, or with a few glan- 

 dular hairs. Lower leaves with recurved margins, hard, thick, linear- 

 lanceolate, nearly triquetrous, acute, entire, dotted with pores at 

 the margin, fringed at the base, when young encrusted. Stem- 

 leaves smaller, linear. Petals obovate, obtuse, white ; twice as long 

 as the sepals. 



Limestone rocks and screes from the snow-line downwards, and 

 sometimes descending into valleys with the debris of streams. 

 June to August. 



Distribution. — Eastern, Central, and Western Alps, Pyrenees, 

 Apennines. Plentiful near the top of the Gemmi Pass. 



Saxifraga aizoides L. S. autumnalis L. is the earlier name, Linnaeus 

 having given two names to the same plant. (Plate XIV.) 



Stem erect or ascending, leafy, bearing a numerous-flowered, 

 racemose cyme, but often only 2-3 flowered, hairy, especially at the 

 summit. The root sends out numerous tufts of leafy shoots. 

 Leaves glabrous, grass-green, nerveless, entire, linear or linear- 

 lanceolate, more or less ciliate, apiculate, alternate, crowded at the 

 apex of the shoots. Calyx hairy at base. Petals linear-lanceolate, 

 as broad as the calyx-teeth, yellow or orange, or indeed any shade 

 from pale yellow to deep orange-red. Stamens orange-yellow. 



