PELARGONIUM malacophyllum.
Soft-leaved Stork’s-bill.
P. malacophyllum, foliis rotundato-reniformibus undulatis
inasqualiter dentatis mollissimis utrinque hirsutis, stipu-
lis ovatis acutis subdentatis, umbellis numerosis sub-
quadrifloris, petalis omnibus obovatis, tubo nectarifero
calyce breviore.
Stem hairs: branches stout, pubescent, thickly clothed with long villous
erect, villosely hairy. Leaves large, broader
than long, roundly kidney-shaped, more or less undulate,
the large ones overlapping at the base, the smaller ones
more distinct, unequally toothed with numerous short rigid
teeth, hairy on both sides, very soft to the touch, feeling
like soft cloth or velvet, rugged or uneven, strongly nerved
underneath,tioles the nerves branching all over the leaves. Pe
flattened and furrowed on the upper side and convex
on the lower, thickly clothed with unequal spreading hairs. Stipules ovate, acute, sometimes toothed, very hairy and
fringed. Flowers in a sort of terminal panicle, purple. Umbels generally four-flowered. Peduncles cylindrical,
thickly clothed with unequal villous hairs, as is the calyx,
bractes, and nectariferous tube. Involucre of six ovate
acute bractes with red membranaceous margins. Pedicles
about the length of, or sometimes a little longer than the
bractes, tinged with purple, as is the calyx and nectariferous
tube. Calyx 5-cleft, the laciniae lanceolate, acute,
the upper one largest. Nectariferous tube scarcely so
long as the calyx, sometimes very short. Petals 5, all
obovate, the two upper ones rather broadest and of the
darkest purple, with a white line or two near the base, from
which branch numerous dark lines much branched : lower
VOL. iv. 2 c