FAMILY HERBAL. _ 61 



1 



stand the flowers ; they are disposed in little round 

 clusters, and are small, and of a pale reddish co- 

 lour, and have a numher of threads in the middle. 

 Burnet is called a cordial, and a sudorific, and is 

 recommended in fevers. They put it also into cool 

 tankards, like borage. The root is a good astrin- 

 gent ; dried and powdered, it stops fluxes, aad 

 overflowings of the menses. 



B0RNET Saxifuage. Fimpinella saxifraga, 



L ■ 



A PRETTY plant, wild in our dry pastures, 

 and under hedges, but not very common in all 

 parts of the kingdom ; it grows two feet high, 

 and has the flowers in umbels. The stalk is 

 firm, striated, and branched ; the leaves rising 

 from the root are pinnated, and the lesser leaves 

 of which they are composed, are hard,- of a deep 

 green, narrow, and indented. The leaves upon 

 the stalks are smaller and n-arrower ; the flowers 

 are little and white, but they stand in so large 

 clusters, (hat they make a figure : the root is 

 white, and of a hot burning taste ; the seeds are 



striated. 



The root is the only part used ; it should be 

 taken up in spring before the stalks shoot up, and 

 dried ; it is very good in colics, and disorders of the 

 stomach, and it works by urine. 



Butter-Bur. Petasites. 



A VERY singular and very conspicuous plant, 

 not unfrequent with us in wet places. The flow- 

 ers appear before the leaves, and they would 

 hardly be supposed to belong to the same plant. 

 The stalks are round, thick, spungy, and of a 

 whitish colour, and have a few films by way of 



