U* HORTUS JAMA I C EN SIS. , turnsoles 



Turnips are accounted a salubrious food ; demulcent, detergent, somewhat laxative 

 and diuretic, but liable, in weak stomachs, to produce flatulencies, and prove difficult 

 of digestion ; the liquor, pressed out from them, after boiling, is sometimes used me- 

 dicinally in coughs and disorders of the breast. The seeds have been accounted alexi- 

 pbarmic or diaphoretic ; they have no smell, but discoveirto the taste a mild acrimony, 

 seemingly of the same nature with that of mustard seed, though far weaker. Leimt* 

 Mat. Med. 



TURNSOLES. HELIOTROPIUM. 



Cl. 5, or. l. Pinta.ndria movoeynia. Nat. or. Asperifoliie. 



- This generic name is derived from two Greek words, signifying the sun and to turn, 

 because the leaves were supposed to turn towards the sun. Hence also the English 

 name. 



Gen. char. Calyx a one-leafed perianth, tubular, five-toothed, permanent ; corolla, 

 monopetalous, salver-shaped ; tube the length of the calyx ; border flat, half 

 five-cleft, obtuse ; clefts smaller, alternate, more acute, between the larger on. :s ; 

 throat naked : stamens five very short filaments, in the throat, anthers small, co- 

 vered: the pistil has four germs, style filiform, length of the stamens; stigma 

 emargiuate : no pericarp ; calyx erect unchanged, cherishing the seeds in its bo- 

 som^ seeds four, ovate, acuminate. Five species are natives of Jamaica. 



1. 1NDICUM. INDIAN. 



Udiotrapiian Americemum terulium, foliis /icrmfni Sloane, v. 1, 

 p. 213. Herbaceummajus hirsutum, faliis rugosis cordato-ovatis, 

 spicis crassis geminatus terminalibus, Browne, p. 150, II. i. 

 Leaves cordate-ovate, acute, somewhat scabrous, spikes solitary, fruits bifid. 

 Stem herbaceous, a foot and a half or two feet high, round, scabrous, hirsute, sub-, 

 divided; leaves cordate-spatulate, ovate, slightly serrate, wrinkled, nerved, hairy, 

 softish ; on pretty long petioles, two and a half inches long, and one and a half broad 

 in the middle. Spikes terminating, single or solitary, sometimes, but very seldom, 

 double ; sometimes also from the sides of the branches, reflex only at the end. Flowers 

 sessile, pointing oneway, approximating in a double ro.v, small, blue; tube very 

 long, cylindric, not globular, as in the others, border scarcely half five-cleft, seg- 

 ments equal, blunt; throat- five- rayed, orange-coloured, closed. Germs in connate 

 pairs; seeds one- celled ; two, three, or four, of unequal sizes, and if more than two 

 die rest are abortive; the fertile ones are ovate, acuminate, swelling a little on the 

 outside, covered *with a juicy bark, an I slightly connected at the base. A decoction 

 of this plant has been found beneficial as a diuretic, iu a suppression of urine." 



Besides the garden clary, we have a very common plant, that grows every where ir*- 

 Jamaica, called wild clary. The sti Ik is large, green, ;mJ hairy, -ising about two feet 

 high; the leaf like garden clarv, having many five-leaved flowers, of a pale blue co- 

 lour, set in a double row uii the upper .-id', of the branches, an Itun like a scorpion's 

 tail. Like the heliotropes, if cleansed) "iiJ consolidates wounds and ulcers, and is,. 

 good against the inflammations mi the skin. Itis boiled oa-nut oil, to cure the 



Sting of scorpion* *ud the bite of aia-d dog. Barham, p. 4 3, 



t. FRUTICuSL'M* 



