Mathiola
(named after Peter Andrew Mathioli, 1500-1577, an Italian physician and celebrated botanist). Stock. ORD. Cruciferae. A genus of about thirty species of hardy, half-hardy, or greenhouse, annual, biennial, or perennial, stellato-tomentose herbs or sub-shrubs, natives of Western and Southern Europe, Western Asia, and (one) South Africa. Flowers often purple, large, racemose, generally sweet-scented; petals with long claws; stigmas connivent, thickened or horned at the back. Seeds thin, flat, numerous; pods large, nearly cylindrical, or compressed. Leaves oblong or linear, entire or sinuate. Mathiolas are well-known plants, largely cultivated in almost every garden, under the popular name of Stocks. There are several sections, and numerous varieties; the flowers represent a great diversity of colour, and are invariably highly perfumed, and of great beauty. Plants may readily be raised from seed, sown in succession on a slight hotbed, from February till April, and the seedlings transplanted, when large enough, to the open ground where they are intended to flower. The Brompton and Intermediate sections should be sown in August and September, and the plants preserved in pots, in a cold frame, throughout the winter, in preparation for flowering early, outside, the following season. Varieties of Mathiola are very extensively cultivated in pots, for greenhouse and other decorations. For general culture of all the sections, see Stocks.
M. annua (annual).* Ten-Weeks Stock. fl. of various colours, pure and variegated, varying from single to double. May to October. Pods somewhat cylindrical, without glands. l. lanceolate, blunt, hoary. Stem herbaceous, erect, branched. h. 1ft. to 2ft. South Europe, 1731. Hardy annual. The Intermediate Stock belongs to this species.
M. bicornis (two-horned).* fl. purplish-red, like those of M. incana, but smaller, sub-sessile; petals oblong-spathulate. Spring. Pods long, terete, cinereous. l. oblong-lanceolate, pinnatifid; upper ones entire. Stem branched. Greece. Half-hardy sub-shrub.
M. fenestralis (fenestrate). fl. scarlet or pale purple, a little smaller than those of M. incana. July and August. Pods pubescent, without glands, broadest at the base. l. crowded, obovate, downy, revolute. Stem erect, simple. h. 1ft. Crete, 1759. Hardy sub-shrub.
M. incana (hoary).* Wallflower-leaved Stock. fl. usually purple. Summer and autumn. Pods somewhat compressed, without glands. l. lanceolate, hoary. Stem shrubby at the base, erect, simple or branched. h. 1ft. to 2ft. South Europe. Half-hardy sub-shrubby biennial. From this species, the Brompton and Queen Stocks have originated, and these are said to be distinguished by the under portion of the leaf of the latter being rough and woolly, whilst the leaf of the former is smooth on both surfaces. flore-pleno is a double-flowered form. M. odoratissima (very sweet-scented). fl. dirty cream-colour, or when old purplish-brown, sweet-scented in the evening. June and July. Pod compressed, somewhat hoary. l. downy or pubescent, toothed or pinnatifid. Stem erect, branched. h. 1ft. to 2ft. Persia, 1795. Greenhouse evergreen sub-shrub. (B. M. 1711.) M. tricuspidata (three-pointed). fl. bright lilac (lighter-coloured towards the base of each petal), in terminal, flexuose, many-flowered racemes. Summer. l., root ones oblong, obtuse, repandly dentate or slightly sinuate; cauline ones more divided, sinuately pinnatifid. h. 1ft. Mediterranean region. Hardy annual. (S. B. F. G. 46.)