April 1, 1865.] THE TECHNOLOGIST. 



NORTHERN PERU. 421 



The whole plant is beset with blackish glands, which are rather 

 protuberant on the petioles and pedicels, but are imbedded in the sub- 

 stance of the leaves and flowers, one in each areole of the network of 

 the veins, so that they can only be seen when the leaf or flower is held 

 up to the light. 



Leaves 3 to 5 (rarely more) on each ramulus, alternate, spreading 

 horizontally on iongish petioles, rather broader than long, deeply heart- 

 shaped at the base, palmately 3 — 5 cleft (the upper ones very rarely 

 entire), more or less beset with slender stellate hairs. On the under side 

 there is usually a concave gland or scrobicule a little above the base of 

 the mid-rib, and a similar one on each side of the two lateral ribs ; but 

 these vary much even on the same plant, and are sometimes obsolete . 

 (The form of the leaves and their stellate pubescence sufficiently recal 

 some of our common mallows and hollyhocks, which are close allies of 

 the cotton-plant ; but the black-currant bush would exactly represent 

 its external aspect if it had only a little larger leaves.) 



Stipules smallish, herbaceous, linear, tapering to a slender point, 

 subfalcate. 



Pedicels short (scarcely an inch long), solitary, one-flowered, not 

 exactly axillary, but springing from the upper side of the ramulus 

 adjacent to the base of the petiole. 



Invulucral leaves 3, large, completely hiding the calyx, and some- 

 times equalling the corolla, valvate, heart-shaped, deeply laciniate, very 

 rarely entire or nearly so ; lacinse subulate, tapering to a long slender 

 point, the numerous ribs (one to each lacinia) forming, with the inter- 

 mediate veins, a prominent network. Usually there is a large circular 

 concave gland at the base of each involucral leaf ; in some forms it is 

 obsolete, and in others its presence is inconstant. 



Calyx closely embracing the base of the corolla, cup-shaped, pale 

 green, pellucid, dotted with prominent black glands, margin usually 

 merely truncato-pentagonous, but in some varieties with the angles 

 elevated into nearly equilateral triangles. 



Petals 5, usually sulphur-yellow, rarely nearly white, with a large 

 blood-red spot near the base, and turning reddish or purplish at the apex 

 after the pollen is shed, broadly cuneate, sub-oblique, united at the base 

 to the staminal tube and to each other into a monopetalous corolla, con- 

 volutivo-imbricate, twisting more and more as they fade, and often not 

 falling off until the capsule is half ripe. 



Stamens numerous, in 5 parcels, combined so as to form a tube half 

 the length of the corolla, and funnel-shaped below ; Jilaments of unequal 

 length, with a very short free apex standing off to the upper part of 

 the tube at a wide angle ; anthers reniform, 2-valved. 



Ovary ovata-tri-pentagonous, 3 — 5-celled, with numerous obovate 



at an elevation of 9,000 feet above the sea, by means of irrigation. I could adduce 

 many other instances of the perennial production of fruits and roots in those 

 favoured regions. 



