60 LYSIMACHIA QUADRIFOLIA. FOUR-LEAVED LOOSESTRIFE. 



the smoke of the plant drives away mosquitoes." It is uncertain, 

 however, whether there are any real medical virtues in our plant. 

 Barton thought there was some merit in it; but Dr. Peyre 

 Porcher, in his " Resources of the Southern Fields and Forests," 

 the latest and most complete work on this subject, merely re- 

 marks that " our Lysimachias should be examined, as the leaves 

 of L. jiummularia (the European moneywort) steeped in oil 

 have the power of destroying insects and worms which infest 

 granaries." 



The " Four-leaved Loosestrife " has been known since the 

 early days of American botany. Plukenet, a contemporary of 

 Tournefort, speaks of it as Anagallis lutca, and in the " Flora 

 Virginica" of Gronovius, it is recorded as an ''Anagallis with 

 yellow flowers," sent to Europe by Clayton. Anagallis is a 

 genus closely allied to Lysimachia, to which latter our plant 

 was transferred by Linnccus. The L. hirsuta of Michaux and 

 the L. punctata of Walter are now regarded as identical with 

 Z. quadrifolia, and these names are therefore synonyms. 



The leaves of most of the species of Lysiniachia are more or 

 lesss dotted like those of our Four-leaved Loosestrife. In our 

 plant the leaves are not always in fours, as its name indicates, 

 but there are sometimes as few as three and as many as seven in 

 a whorl. In a specimen now before the writer, the lowest whorl 

 has three leaves, the ne.xt four, the third five, the fourth seven. 

 The flowers also have this tendency to vary, and our faithful 

 artist has shown a flower (marked 3 in the plate) with six petals. 



Our plant is common in the seaboard Atlantic States as far as 

 South Carolina, but has not crossed the Mississippi River, nor 

 has it been collected west of Michigan, but is included in Mr. 

 Coleman's list of the plants of that state. 



Explanation (JK THE Plate. — i. The lower portion of the flower-stem. — 2. Upper por- 

 tion of the same. — 3. A six-petalled flower. 



