CLAYTONIA VIRGINICA. 



SPRING-BEAUTY, NOTCH-PETALLED CLAYTONIA. 



NATURAL ORDER, PORTULACACE/E. 



Cl.AYTONiA ViRGlNiCA, L. — Root a dccp tubcr ; stems six to ten inches long, simple; leaves 

 mostly two, linear-lanceolate, an opposite pair near the middle of the stem, from three to 

 nine inches in length; flowers pale red, with purple veins, usually six to twelve, or even 

 fifteen, in a loose, simple, terminal raceme. (Darlington's Flora Cestrka. See also 

 Gray's Manual of tJic Botany of the Northern United States, Chapman's Flora of the 

 Southern United States, and Wood's Class-Book of Botany.) 



N the early part of the last century, when Linnaeus had 

 just succeeded in reducing botany from a mass of con- 

 fusion to something like order, the native flowers of our own 

 country were beginning to attract the attention of the scientific 

 men of Europe. The Dutch botanists had established close 

 relationship with Americans, and as early as 1739 Gronovius 

 published at Leyden a " Flora Virginica," the figures and 

 descriptions for which were furnished by John Clayton, of Vir- 

 ginia, who did wonders, for that early period, in making our 

 native plants known. At the same time, John Bartram, farmer, 

 physician, mechanic, and botanist, who lived in Pennsylvania, 

 was in active correspondence with England, and sent roots and 

 seeds to his friends there. 



In view of the eminent services which Clayton rendered to 

 American botany, it is very fitting that a genus so interesting 

 and so peculiarly American as the one to which our plant 

 belongs should have been named in his honor. Nor is there 

 much danger that the monument thus erected to Clayton's 

 memory will ever be destroyed, as has been the case with so 

 many similar monuments dedicated to other botanists, for the 



