tiles


Note:  Do not rely on this information. It is very old.

Mallow

Mallow, the popular name of the genus Malva, which gives its name to the dicotyledonous order Malvaoeae, and of some allied plants such as the marsh-mallow, Altkcca officinalis. Malva comprises about 16 species of herbaceous plants, natives of the northern hemisphere, three of which are British. The leaves are palmately-veined; the flowers, white or pink: there is an involucre of three small bracts below each flower: the five persistent sepals are valvate and united; the five petals, convolute and slightly united; the five stamens, at a very early stage copiously branched and united in a tube (monadelphous), the filaments bearing kidney-shaped one-chambered anthers, which split transversely; and the numerous one-seeded carpels are united in a ring, known to country children as "cheeses," round a short carpophore. The pinkish-purple petals of the common mallow (M. sylvestris), known in France as mauve, which are marked with distinct honey-guides, or lines to guide insects to the honey, have given its name to the aniline dye, mauve. The root of the marsh-mallow, being, like all the group, rich in mucilage, is used in making guimauve cough lozenges.