GENTI.\.V. 217 



their persons should be considered equally sacred 

 With that of their sovereign, or the country which 

 they represent. 



Martyn enumerates fifty-three species of Gen- 

 tian ; but he observes that the numerous species of 

 this genus have very few characters in common, 

 which has induced some botanists to range them 

 under separate genera. Alton, therefore, notices 

 but twenty-two distinct species in the Hortus 

 Kewcnsis; and, as ornaments to the open garden, 

 we shall regard but a small portion of these moun- 

 tainous plants, some of which are said to perish 

 when exposed to the rising sun. The Yellow 

 Gentian, Lutea, has been made the emblem of in- 

 gratitude, because it so frequently dies under the 

 culture of the gardener. This species is a native 

 of France, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Sweden, 

 Lapland, and North America ; and is of so strong 

 a bitter, that where it abounds, whole tracts of 

 country may be seen untouched by the bite of any 

 kind of cattle : but still it is not without its use in 

 the economy of Nature, which renders it profitable 

 to those whose lands it has usurped ; for it is the 

 root of this species of Gentian which we import 

 from Switzerland, and other places, as a medicinal 

 drug, on account of its bitter being highly es- 

 teemed, not only as a tonic and stomachic, but also 

 anthelmintic, antiseptic, emmenagogue, antiarthri- 



