May 1, 1865.] THE TECHNOLOGIST. 



NORTHERN PERU. 435 



Descr. — Rather low and bushy. Ramuli and petioles nearly naked, 

 smooth {not tuberculate). Leaves 6'2 x 5-8 inches, greyish-green, nearly 

 flat, naked above save a-few scattered hairs on veins, beneath stellato- 

 puberulous, 3—5- cleft '.'to a little beyond the middle, segments ovate, sub- 

 abruptly and sharply accumulate. Involucral leaves green, 2 2 x 1*85 

 inches, shorter than the sulphur-coloured petals, laciniated all round, 

 bearing a red gland at base. Calyx-lobes shortly triangular, mostly with 

 rounded sinuses. Pods ovate 3-4 (very rarely 5-) celled. Seeds 7 or 8 

 in a cell, densely clad with green (rarely brown) fuzz. 



Contents of a 4-celled capsule 110J grs—viz., 29 seeds, 73| grs.; cotton 

 37 grs., or 33^ per cent, of gross weight. 



Obs. — Grows taller than the preceding, but has much the same 

 aspect, and the leaves, though larger, are flattish and shortly lobed as in 

 the Egyptian. The cotton is long and silky, scarcely interior to Sea 

 Island, in this respect surpassing the Egyptian, but far inferior in the 

 amount of yield. The crop is rather precarious ( and it is rare to find a 

 perfect capsule, the cotton being geuerally injured or imperfectly de- 

 veloped in one or more of the cells. 



5. Algodon de Imbabura (Imbabura Cotton). The produce of seeds 

 brought from the Andes of Ecuador. 



Dkscr. — Whole plant clad with short soft pubescence. Hamuli very 

 long, sometimes twelve inches to the first leaf. Leaves 7 x 95 inches, 

 3-5-cleft clown to f, segments ovato- lanceolate subacuminate, keeled or 

 subplicate on the ribs, stoutish, puberulous above, tomentellous and hoary 

 beneath. Involucral leaves 2'5 x 2 inches, deeply laciniate nearly all 

 round the margin, bearing a broad basal gland. Calijx-lobes very short, 

 obtuse. Petals sulphur -yellow, much exceeding involucre (twice as long as 

 the latter without the lacinise). Pod, narrow, ovate, or oval, with a 

 short acumen or beak, 2 6 x 1-4 inches (beak 3 to 4 inches) protruding 

 beyond the involucre. Seeds about 8 in each cell, clad with greenish-grey 

 fuzz. 



Contents of a S-celled capside 83 grs. — viz., 23 seeds 51 grs. ; cotton 

 32 grs., or about 38| per cent, of gross weight. 



Obs. — This is the common cotton of the Equatorial Andes, where I 

 have seen it cultivated in sheltered spots up to 8,000 feet. Humboldt, 

 and after him Boussingault, seem to have met with it at a still greater 

 elevation. It is most extensively grown in temperate valleys of the 

 Province of Imbabura, between Quito and Pasto. I take it to be the 

 Gossypium tomeutosum, H.B.K., a name which well expresses its differ- 

 ence from the ordinary forms of G. barbadensc, to which species I refer 

 it as a variety, lor the other characters are very slight, and even the 

 tomentosity is a common accident to plants which climb the hills from 

 the plains. A patch of Imbabura cotton is readily distinguished from 

 other kinds growing near it by the hoary appearance of the tall well- 

 grown plants, and by its showing its clear sulphur flowers and long 

 beaked pods farther beyond the involucres than any other kind. No 



