THE CAULESCEXCE OF BELLIS PERENNIS 
103 
in Rev. Sci. Nat. iii. 558, where he suggests that the plant under 
Decandolle’s eye was not B. hybrida at all. It may here be re¬ 
marked that although B. silvestris begins to flower about the end of 
September, its flowering season overlaps the beginning of perennis , 
so that hybridism between the two is not absolutely excluded by the 
great difference in the usual date of flowering. So-called summer 
flowering of silvestris is confined to the upper mountains in southern 
and central Italy, and is marked by smaller less characteristic indi¬ 
viduals than are seen lower down in autumn and winter, but there is 
nothing to suggest that these are hybrids. 
To return to Decandolle’s error; there may be another explanation 
than that hinted at by Loret. It is not impossible that Decandolle 
may have misapprehended Bertoloni’s remark (Mant. PL Alp. Apuan. 
59, 1832) “ magnitudine partium media inter Bellidem perennem et 
Bellidem sylvestrem which is true as far as mere size is concerned, 
but not otherwise. In that work Bertoloni regarded not only 
B. hybrida , but even B. silvestris as a variety of B. perennis. Then 
in the Flora Italica (ix. 517-519 ; 1853) he reinstates both sil¬ 
vestris and hybrida as independent species, but says of the latter 
“ media inter B. perennem et B. sylvestrem ,” omitting the words 
“ magnitudine partium,” and thus committing himself, intentionally 
or unintentionally, to Decandolle’s mistake. These passages imiy 
have contributed to form Bentham’s untenable view as to the specific 
identity of silvestris and perennis , on which he dwelt in his well- 
known address to the British Association in 1S61 (see Nat. Hist. 
Review, i. p. 133). 
The authors who have taken up B. hybrida as a separate species, 
besides Tenore, are Gussone, PI. Sic. Syn. ii. 508 (1843) and PI. 
Inar. 164 (1855), Bertoloni, loc. cit. (1853), Caruel, Prodr. FI. Tosc. 
335 (I860), Arcangeli, Comp. FI. It. 342 (1882), and Halacsy, PI. 
Gr. ii. 12 (1902). They add nothing to our knowledge, except 
Gussone’s remark that B. annua is not found in the island of Ischia, 
for which he records B. perennis and B. hybrida , thus reinforcing 
the objections to the hypothesis of a hybrid origin. 
B. hybrida has been distributed in the PI. Italica Exsiccata, 
no. 1151. The specimens were collected by me at a spot where I have 
long been familiar with this daisy, at Ravello in the province of 
Salerno, in rich turf on limestone, not volcanic soil. Although all 
gathered within a few yards of each other, they vary from plants 
exhibiting the extreme form described by Tenore to others that match 
English and French “ subcaulescent ” specimens. I have three ex¬ 
amples in my herbarium, one from Pome, one from Ravello, and one 
from southern Calabria, in which the rhizome bears many stems, most 
of them branched and some carrying as many as six to eight flower- 
stalks. Caulescent plants predominate in rich moist situations in all 
parts of Italy where the rainfall is considerable, especially if the soil 
is free. In drier districts or stiffer soils marked caulescence is rarer. 
The fully developed hybrida , not only caulescent, but conspicuously 
branched, is less plentiful; its luxuriance is obviously due to copious 
moisture and nourishment in a mild climate. Remarkably caulescent 
plants, though not attaining to such luxuriance, occur in other parts 
