By Joseph Sabine, Esq. 



451 



7. Crocus bielorus. Scotch Crocus. 



1. C. Biflorus communis. 



2. C. Paukinsonii. 



3. C. stigmatosus. 



I have not been able to discover the reason why this has 

 been called the Scotch Crocus. The apparent. authority for 

 the appellation is Miller, who in the first Edition of his 

 Dictionary in 1731, says it is commonly called " The Scots 

 Crocus." The specific name biflorus has been also derived 

 from Miller ; in the seventh Edition of the Gardener's Dic- 

 tionary, published in 1759, this is placed as a species with 

 the following character, " spatha b 'ifiora corollas tubo tenuis- 

 simo," which is further explained by the statement that it 

 " rises with a few very narrow leaves, which are together 

 with the flower buds closely wrapped round with a spathe or 

 sheath, out of which arise two flowers." When the plant 

 was published in the Botanist's Repository, it was called C. 

 biflorus, certainly without much examination, for, if Miller's 

 description be taken strictly, what he calls the spathes are 

 the leaf-sheaths, which in all the species of Crocus, when 

 in a healthy state, envelope more than one flower, and there- 

 fore could not be peculiar to this ; and if the term spathe 

 had been applied by the author of the Repository to the 

 sheath at the base of the scape, then the description would 

 not have been referable to this species, in which this sheath 

 is obsolete. 



Miller makes no mention of the singularly circular hori- 

 zontal division of the covering of the root, nor is it noticed 

 either in the description or figure of the Botanist's Repo- 

 sitory, though it is well described by Parkinson. This 



