audi 
140 THE ROSE FAMILY. [ Sibbaldia. : 
the green calyxes are the most conspicuous, the petals being very small and 
of a pale yellow, or occasionally wanting. The lobes of the calyx often 
closed over the carpels after flowering, but the latter are not enclosed 
within the tube as in Alchemilla. (Potentilla Sibbaldi, Hall. f.) 
In the mountains of northern and Arctic Europe, Asia, and America, or 
at greater elevations, in the higher ranges of central Europe and Asia. 
Frequent in the Scotch Highlands, constituting in some places a consider- 
able portion of the greensward, but unknown in England or Ireland. F/. 
summer. 
IX. ALCHEMILLA. ALCHEMIL. 
Tufted herbs, either annual or with a perennial, almost woody stock, and 
annual flowering-stems, palmately lobed or divided leaves, and small green 
flowers, in loose panicles or in small sessile heads. Calyx free, double, that 
is, of 8 divisions, of which 4 alternate ones are outside and ‘smaller. No 
petals. Stamens 4 or fewer. Carpels 1 or 2, 1-seeded, and enclosed in the 
dry tube of the calyx. 
The species are very few, but widely spread over the northern hemisphere, 
chiefly in mountainous districts. The palmate, not pinnate leaves, and in- 
florescence, readily distinguish them from the two following apetalous 
genera. 
Perennial. Flowers in terminal panicles. 
Leaves green on both sides, with short, broad, palmate pe . Ll. A. vulgaris. 
Leaves silvery shining underneath, deeply palmate 4 - . 2 A. alpina. 
Small annual. Flowers minute, in sessile axillary heads. = . 3&3 A. arvensis. 
1. A. vulgaris, Linn. (fig. 322). Common Alchemil, Lady’s-mantle. 
—A perennial, either glabrous or more or less hairy, but always green, not 
silvery. Radical leaves large, on long stalks, broadly orbicular or reni- 
form, divided only to a fourth or a third of their depth into 7 or 9 broad, 
regularly-toothed lobes. Flowering-stems decumbent or ascending, seldom 
above 6 inches high, bearing a few small leaves on short stalks, with large, 
green, toothed stipules, and a loose panicle of small, green flowers, each 
borne on a little pedicel, generally at least as long as the tube of the calyx. 
In meadows and pastures, in northern and Arctic Europe and Asia, be- 
coming more restricted to mountain-ranges in central and southern Europe 
and central Asia. Generally distributed over Britain, but scarce in south- 
eastern England. 7. spring and summer. 
2. 4. alpina, Linn. (fig. 8323). Alpine Alchemil.—An elegant plant, 
with much of the general habit of 4. vulgaris, but known at once by the 
shining silvery hairs, which cover the stems and under side of the leaves. 
The stock often emits short, creeping runners. Leaves smaller than in 4, 
vulgaris, and divided to the base, or nearly so, into 5 or 7 oblong, almost 
entire segments. Flowers in little, dense corymbs, which form short, 
interrupted spikes or panicles at the ‘ends of the branches. 
In the principal mountain-ranges of Europe, but generally at greater ele- 
vations than A. vulgaris, and in Asia and America almost restricted to the 
Arctic regions, Abundant in many parts of the Scotch Highlands and 
of northern England, and occurs also in the mountains of Kerry and Sligo 
in Ireland. Fl. summer. [A. argentea, Don (conjuncta, Bab.), is a 
curious sport, with the leaflets connate below the middle, found ina row 
spots in Scotland, as well as in France and Switzerland. ] 
