SCROPHULARIA. 



1048. S. nodosa Linn. sp. pi. 863. Eng.Bot. t. 1544. Smith 

 Eng. Fl. iii. 137. — Hedges woods and thickets in most parts of 

 Europe. (Figwort.) 



Herbage nearly or quite smooth, fetid like Elder when bruised. 

 Root whitish, tuberous, beset with fleshy knobs. Stem 2 or 3 feet high, 

 nearly simple, leafy, acutely quadrangular, smooth. Leaves stalked, 

 ovate-oblong, acute, sharply and unequally serrated ; heart-shaped at 

 the base, where they are cut away, as it were, to the 2 small lateral 

 ribs. Flower-stalks axillary and terminal, forked, angular, glandular, 

 forming a panicled, leafy cluster. Bracteas lanceolate. Flowers a little 

 drooping. Calyx smooth. Corolla of a dull green, with a livid purple 

 lip. Capsule ovate-oblong. Smith. — Leaves and roots said to be 

 purgative and emetic. They have a bitter taste, and a heavy disagreeable 

 smell. A decoction of the leaves is used by farmers to cure the scab 

 in swine. Burnett. 



1049. S. aquatica Linn. sp. pi. 864. Eng. Bot. t. 854. 

 Smith Eng. Fl. iii. 138. — Ditches and watery places in many 

 parts of Europe. (Water Betony.) 



Root entirely fibrous. Herb quite smooth, foetid, of a deep shining 

 green. Stem taller than S. nodosa, straight, leafy, nearly simple, 

 winged in some degree at the four angles. Leaves copiously and finely 

 serrated, veiny, ovate-oblong; heart-shaped at the base, and running 

 down the edges of the footstalks ; their lateral ribs not reaching to the 

 margin of the leaf. Cluster of many forked branches, bearing numerous 

 flowers, whose tube is green, the limb of a dark blood-red, more con- 

 spicuous than in S. nodosa. Capsule globular. Smith. — Properties 

 much as in the last species. Burnett however says that they cannot be 

 very unwholesome plants, because the garrison of Rochelle, during the 

 celebrated siege by Cardinal Richelieu in 1628, supported themselves 

 in their extremity by eating the roots of S. aquatica, which has since 

 that time been called by the French, herbe du siege. 



HERPESTES. 



Calyx 5-parted ; the upper sepal very large, ovate, the 2 lowest 

 narrower, the 2 lateral ones linear and covered by the rest. 

 Corolla tubular, somewhat 2-lipped ; the upper lip bifid, the 

 lower trifid, with all the segments flat and nearly equal. Sta- 

 mens didynamous, enclosed ; anthers approximated in pairs, 

 with diverging or divaricating segments which finally become 

 somewhat confluent. Capsule scarcely furrowed, 4-valved, with 

 the edges of the valves flat. 



1050. H. Monniera HBK. n. g. et. sp. ii. 294. Benth. scroph. 

 ind. 30. — Gratiola Monniera Linn, amcen. acad. iv. 306. Roxb. 

 jl. ind.. i. 141. Monniera Brownei Pers. syn. i. 116. M. cunei- 



folia Mx'.fl. bor. am. ii. 22. Herpestes cuneifolia Pursh.jl. am. 

 sept, ii.418. H. procumbens Spreng. syst. ii. 802. Bramia indica 

 Lam. enc. i. 459. Calytriplex obovata R. and P.fl. peruv.prodr. 

 t. xix. — Tropical parts of the world in both hemispheres. 

 Stems several, annual, creeping, round, jointed, very branching, 

 503 K K 4 



