CLASS PENTANDRIA. 67 



toothed calyx ; the seeds, also, unlike Anchusa, are 

 imperforate or without hollows at the base, and are 

 smooth on the surface. 



The Eehium, or Viper's-bu gloss, so called in allusion 

 to the style, which looks like the forked tongue of a 

 snake, is here better known, at least, in Virginia and 

 Pennsylvania, by the name of Blueweed, as when in 

 flower, which is almost throughout the summer, its 

 blue and abundant blossoms form a striking feature to 

 every observer. In this genus the calyx will be found 

 divided into 5 narrow segments ; and the corolla 

 almost entirely open, and naked of scales, somewhat 

 resembles a bell with an unequally 5-lobed border, 

 of which the lower segment is acute and reflected. 

 The stamens and style are conspicuously exerted or 

 stretched out, and the stigma forked ; the seeds pre- 

 sent a tubercular surface, and are imperforate. 



In Myosotis, Mouse-ear, or Scorpion-grass, the 

 latter name from its ancient reputed virtues, and which 

 vou will find common by the margins of springs, the 

 corolla has the form of a salver, with the border divid- 

 ed into 5 very obtuse shallow lobes, with its sta- 

 mens entirely hidden by 5 projecting bodies which 

 close up the opening of the tube of the corolla ; the 

 seeds are naked, and, as in all the rest of the preced- 

 ing genera, fixed merely to the bottom of the calyx, 

 an arrangement which you will find very different in the 

 Cynoglossum, Hound's-tongue, and Rochelia, both, 

 till very "lately, species of one genus, differing chiefly 

 in their seeds, which are even, and flattened down into 

 hollows in the Hound's-tongue ; but prickly or very 

 rough, and simply flattened, in Rochelia ; but in both, 

 the seeds are fixed to a distinct central column or 

 receptacle ; the corolla in each is closed, as in Myo- 

 sotis, by 5 obtuse projections, short and funnel-form 

 also in Cynoglossum. but salver-formed in UorhrJia. 



