108 CICUTA. No. 32. 



posite, lanceolate, serrate, acuminate, with veins end- 

 ing at the notches, which is very unusual. 



Flowers white in terminal umbelsjwithoutinvolucres, 

 umbels with seven to twelve umbellules, each having 

 from twelve to twenty flowers, upright, not crowd- 

 ed : Involuceli: very short, oblong, acute ; calix con- 

 nected with the pistil, crowned, crown with five 

 minute segments. Petals five obovatcj white, entire, 

 end inflexed. Filaments longer filiform, anthera 

 oval. Twoshort recurved styles. Fruit nearly globular, 

 divisible into two Seeds as in all the umbellate plants, 

 each is flat inside, convex outside, vvith five furrows. 

 Locality — In wet meadows, pastures, and ditch- 

 es ; near streams and swamps, from New England to 

 Georgia and Ohio : also in the mountains of Penn- 



-sylvania and Virginia. — Blossoming in summer, from 

 July to August. 



HISTORY — The genus Cicvta is one of the poi- 

 sonous hemlocks ; the Cmihim macnlalum, is, how- 

 ever, considered as the true hemlock and the most 

 virulent : but the deadly poison of that name (ren- 

 dered famous by the death of Socrates) was a com- 

 pound beverage. In the United States, the same 

 name is capriciously give.i to a beautiful and useful 

 species of Fir-tree. 



Both Cicxda and Conhtm belong to the natural or- 

 der of c^^iBELLATE, or Umbelliferous plants, and to 

 P£NTANDRiA digynia of Linnffius, although they 

 have only one pistil. 



Ckuta was the old latin name, maculata mezns 

 spotted ; but the plant not bein^ snntfpd. \t is a very 



