CAMPANULA BALCHINIANA. 



271 



CAMPANULA BALCHINIANA x . 

 This plant was one of the curiosities of the last Temple Show, 

 and many people who saw it there, without having the oppor- 

 tunity of a close examination, could scarcely credit that it was a 

 true Campanula, but such it is. 



The following description appeared at the time in the 

 Garde?iers' Chronicle: — 



" The stems are slender, prostrate, and, like the leaves, 

 densely hirsute, with longish, straight, white hairs. The leaf- 

 stalks are about 4 cent, (say 1| inch) long, sulcate, expanding 

 into a roundish, coarsely- toothed limb, the disc of which is 

 green, the edges creamy white. When quite young, the leaves 

 are of pale violet colour. The flowers are solitary, on long, 

 slender stalks. The ovary, which in Campanulas is inferior, 

 beneath the flower, and very conspicuous, with the sepals and 

 petals spreading from its upper edge, is in these specimens wholly 

 superior and enclosed within the flower. The sepals are re- 

 presented by five, shortly-stalked, green leaves ; the corolla is 

 regular, like that of C. isophylla, with a short, open tube, 

 expanding into five flat petals. There are five stamens, with 

 imperfect anthers and a style. 



11 Learning that this plant had been raised by an eminent 

 botanist, Mr. William Mitten, we appealed to him for further 

 information, which he has been kind enough to give us, as 

 follows : — 



" ' The variegated Campanula grown by Messrs. Balchin & 

 Son was raised by me from seed taken from C. fragilis and C. 

 isophylla alba ; these, standing in pots, I had endeavoured to 

 intercross, and capsules taken from both supplied the seeds, which 

 were sown together. Excepting the two plants with variegated 

 foliage, which are a little more robust in growth, there was no 

 appearance that C. isophylla had any influence on the progeny. 

 There was much variation in the pilosity of the seedlings, but all 

 were blue-flowered, and none different from the ordinary state of 

 C. fragilis. I might have applied pollen of C. turbinata as well, 

 but there was no trace of that species in the seedlings. No self- 

 sown seedlings have ever occurred to me of C. isophylla, which 

 I have only in the white-flowered form ; but young plants of C. 

 fragilis come up everywhere. I left Messrs. Balchin to put any 

 name to the plant they chose. Not much was anticipated from 



