HURT US JAMA I EN SIS. Rue 



( '' .1 -". -Racbis jointed, roundish, filiform; calyx ovate-lanceolate, flat, one 

 or two-valved ; florets alternate, on a flexuose.rachis. Swartg found one speoies 

 oJ this grass in Jamaica. 



EXALTATA. EXALTED. 



Spike round, filiform, fioscular everyway ; glumes ovate, blunt; sheaths dotted 

 and hirsute. 



Culm from two to six feet high, upright, sub-divided, striated, semi-cylindrical, 

 ; hed, branchlets upright ; leaves a foot long, broad-linear, spreading, eveu, car- 

 tilaginous- serrate at the edge ; sheaths two or three inches in length, striated, dotted, 

 hispid-hirsute, rough-haired at the mouth; hairiness thin, white, pungent. Spikes 

 solitaiy, t'.vo or three inches long, cylindrical, jointed, acuminate, even, green - ; 

 florets sessile, alternate; rachis flexuose, with excavations for the florets, which form 

 a round spike. .The exterior fiowers are male, the interior hermaphrodite, within the 

 calycine gltue.es. Glume two-vaived, two-floweretf; outer valve ovate-acute, 

 pressed close to the spike ; inner arched, involving the hermaphrodite flower. Corolla 

 of the male flo.ver two-i'alved, valves .smaller, white,.; the nectary consists of two 

 truncate petals at the 'fease of the filaments. Anthers red, fertile, they- are often ba.r- 

 ren and then are ye'llow ; no pistil. Hermaphrodite withia the male, and not visible 

 I I that l;e removed : the corolla of the hermaphrodite is also two-vaked ; the 



valves whitish and fugacious; anthers often barren; germ roundish; stigma villose., 

 purple. Alter the male flower falls, the seed ripens within the rachis, and, when ripe 5 

 forls off, the spike breaking. 'Sw. 



RU1 . RUTA. 



Cl. 10, or. I. Dccandria monogynia. Nat, ow.Multisiliqutc. 

 il :. CHAR. Calyx a live-parted perianth ; corolla five concave petals ; stamens ten 

 awl-shaped filaments; anthers erect ; pistil a gibbous germ crossed, surrounded 

 by honey dots ; style erect; stigma simple ; receptacle surrounded by ten honey 

 dots; the pericarp a gibbous fivc-lobed capsule; seeds very many, rugged. 



GRAYEOI.F.NS. 



Leaves super-decompound ; leaflets oblong, the end one ob-ovate ; petals quite 

 entire. 



The common or garden rue has been cultivated in Jamaica, with success, for more 

 than a century past ; frequently rising to the height of live or six feet. The lobes' of 

 the leaves are wedge-shaped, of a grey colour, ajad strong odour. The flowers are 

 produced at the ends of the branches, in the form almost of umbels, they are composed 

 of four yellowish petaLs, cut cm their edges, and only eight stamens, the centre flower 

 of the umbel having generally live petals and ten stamen-. 



Rue has a strong ungrateful smell, and a bitterish penetrating taste: the leaves, 

 when full of vigour, are extremely acid, insomuch as to inflame and blister the skin, 

 if much handled. With regard to their medicinal virtues, they are powerfully stimu- 

 lating, attenuating, and detergent ; audience, in cold phlegmatic habits, they quicken 



the 



