PRIMULA CONFERENCE. 



145 



P. cinerascens, Franch., P. sinomollis, Balf. fil., and P. violodora, 

 Dunn. Here again we have the Indo-Chinese relationship to which I 

 have referred previously. All these plants have petiolate rounded 

 leaves, gray through covering of hairs, and long scapes with tiers of 

 red flowers, each flower with a cup-shaped to campanulate ribbed 

 calyx forming straight erect lobes hardly accrescent. 



Of the Chinese species P. sinomollis, Balf. fil. only is in cultivation, 

 introduced by Mr. Williams in 1913, the seed collected by Forrest. It 

 is a good plant and may rival P. mollis, Nutt., as an early-flowering 

 species of the greenhouse. 



Chinese Species of the Mollis Section. 

 Rich red flowers. 

 P. cinerascens, Franch. 

 P. sinomollis, Balf. fil. (fig. 48) 

 P. violodora, Dunn 



Section Malvacea. 



Of the distinct forms of Primula included in Sinensis by Pax none 

 is more striking, because so unlike the Primula of common acceptation, 

 than those of this section. P. malvacea, Franch., is not inappro- 

 priately named and may be taken as the type. It has large basal petio- 

 late, nearly orbicular leaves, and sends up a long scape which bears at 

 irregular intervals whorls of flowers, the calyx of which in fruit develops 

 as a broad green leafy expansion, investing the small globose capsule 

 much after the fashion, as Franchet has pointed out, of Androsace 

 maxima. It has pale lilac flowers. A plant of the limestone in Yunnan, 

 its texture reflects its environment. In P. blattariformis, Franch., also 

 a limestone plant, the leaves form a close rosette and the flowers are 

 more regularly spicate or racemed on the scape. A first glance at 

 the plant suggests Verbascum, and Franchet has well named the 

 species. It also has lilac flowers. 



P. pintchouanensis, Petitm., and P. bathangensis, Petitm., are 

 yellow-flowered forms closely resembling P. malvacea, Franch. , perhaps 

 only colour microforms of it. The former, in the type specimens 

 which I have seen, is more of a xeromorph than P. malvacea, the vein- 

 ing in leaf and in the calyx under fruit being more prominent ; the 

 latter more hygrophilous, having somewhat membranous leaves, 

 and the calyx expansion in fruit is also membranous. The habitat 

 of the type specimens of P. bathangensis, Petitm., which I have seen 

 is 1 Vallee de Bathang, pres des eaux chaudes,' and this suggests, that 

 the diagnostic characters given for the species may be no more than 

 those of a growth-form. P. racemosa, Bonati, described in 1909, 1 have 

 not seen, but the description of it and the diagnostic characters given 

 by Bonati suggest a doubt of its difference from P. bathangensis, 

 Petitm. A sixth species of the section is P. neurocalyx, Franch., 

 smaller than the others, but showing the typical features of the section. 

 P. Rosthornii, Diels, is said by Petitmengin to be the same as P. 

 neurocalyx, Franch. I have not seen specimens of P. Rosthornii, 



VOL. xxxix. L 



