A small genus of Asiatic herbs resembling the Thistles in their foliage. Flowers in dense clusters in the axils of the upper smaller leaves. Corolla-tube long, slender, curved; limb irregular. Stamens 4, didynamous, or united in pairs. Named in honour of a French botanist.

I. M. longifolia. - A perennial about 2 feet high with large lobed spinescent radical leaves and showy rosy carmine and white flowers, produced in June and July. A native of the Himalayan mountains.

Cephalaria Tartdarica is an allied tall perennial bearing large heads of pale yellow flowers, in which the involucels exceed the florets.