Paleolaria
ORD. Compositae. A genus comprising half a dozen species of hardy, or nearly hardy, erect herbs, rarely shrubby at base, natives of Mexico and Florida. Flower-heads white, flesh-colour, or purple, small or mediocre, loosely corymbose-paniculate; involucre turbinate-campanulate, the bracts one or two-serrate; receptacle small, flat, naked, or scarcely foveolate. Leaves alternate, or the lower ones opposite, narrow, entire. The undermentioned species, which are the only ones worth growing, thrive best in a warm border of sandy soil, and should be treated as half-hardy annuals. Seeds should be sown, in a gentle heat, during April, and the young plants placed in the open, about 1ft. apart, early in June.
P. Hookeriana (Hooker's). fl.-heads rosy-pink, freely produced in loose clusters. Summer. Stems very bushy, about 2ft. high. Rocky Mountains, 1865. A very pretty, dwarf-growing, dense-habited plant. See Fig. 8. (B. M. 5549.) P. linearis (linear). fl.-heads flesh-colour; involucre oblong; pappus scales eight, unequal, acuminate. June. l. linear, entire, obtuse. h. 2ft. Texas. Plant shrubby, cinereo-pubescent. (B. M. 2132.) PALAVA (named in honour of A. Palau y Verdera, professor of botany at Madrid in the last century). ORD. Malvaceae. A small genus (three or four species) of tomentose or nearly glabrous, hardy or half-hardy, annual herbs, natives of Peru or Chili, and with habit similar to Cristaria. Flowers purple, pedunculate, axillary, solitary; calyx five-fid. Leaves often lobed, sinuate, or dissected. The species thrive in ordinary garden soil. Propagated by seeds, sown on a hotbed in early spring, the seedlings being transplanted to the open border in May.
P. flexuosa (flexuous-stemmed). fl. light mauve, pale towards the centre, with bright red anthers and bases of the petals; sepals purple at base, very much smaller than the obliquely truncate petals. June. l. on slender petioles, 1in. to 2in. long; blade 1in. to 2in. long and broad, oblong-ovate or triangular-ovate, pinnatifid, with one or two pairs of spreading, lobed, or irregularly pinnatifid segments. Stems 8in. to 10in. long. Peru. 1866. (B. M. 5768.) P. rhombifolia (rhomb-leaved). fl. large, scentless; corolla rose-coloured, flat, thrice as long as the calyx; petals five, obovate, cuneate; peduncles solitary, axillary. Summer. l. 1 3/4in. long, rhomboid, soft. Stem prostrate, branched, hairy. Peru, 1830. (B. M. 3100; B. R. 1375.)