CLASS PENTANDRIA. 69 



find a rather common, and very humble, but beauti- 

 ful garden-weed, the Pimpernel, Red-Chickweed, or 

 Poor-man's Weather-glass (Jlnagallis arvcnsis), it 

 scarcely differs from the preceding genus in anything 

 but the dehiscence of the capsule, which is globose, 

 one-celled, and many-seeded ; and instead of longi- 

 tudinal valves, opens transversely all round into 2 

 pretty equal cups or hemispheres ; the common kind 

 is a low annual plant, trailing or procumbent on the 

 ground, with opposite, sitting, ovate leaves; and axillary, 

 solitary, or singly disposed flowers, of a pretty scarlet 

 color, never open but in the sunshine of a fine day, 

 and closing at the approach of storm and darkness. 

 There is another kind, occasionally cultivated, with 

 flowers of as bright a blue as the others are scarlet. 



Another well known family of this class is the 

 CoNVOLvuLi,of which the Bindweed, or Convolvulus, 

 is the principal genus. They derive their name from 

 their slender twining stems, and are among the more 

 common plants which we cultivate, as well as wild in 

 our bushy and rich woods. They are known, at once, 

 by the large, somewhat bell-shaped, and plaited corol- 

 la, which before and after opening resembles a twisted 

 cone ; the border is almost equal, though a division 

 into 5 superficial lobes is not unapparent, and in- 

 deed, quite obvious in the Cypress-vine, or Quamoclit, 

 of the following, and once united genus Ipomaia, 

 The calyx is 5-parted, and either naked at the base, 

 or subtended by 2 bractes, which last character, 

 with some others not sufficiently apparent, have led 

 some botanists still further to divide the old genus 

 of Convolvulus. There are 2 stigmas, but only 1 

 in Ipomcea ; a capsule of 2 or 3 cells, with the 

 same number of valves, and each cell containing J 

 or 2 seeds. Their flowers only open in the morn- 

 ing sunshine, und wither by noon. The purple Bind^ 



