SEDUM NEVII. 



NEVIUS' STONE-CROP. 



NATURAL ORDER, CRASSULACE^. 



Sedum Nevii, Gray. — Stems low, three to five inches, ascending; leaves alternate, scattered 

 linear-clavate, obtuse ; flowers sessile, scattered along the widely spreading or recurved 

 branches of the simple cyme ; bracts linear, longer than the flowers ; sepals linear-lanceo- 

 late, acutish, as long as the lanceolate white petals; stamens eight, shorter than the 

 petals ; anthers purplish-brown ; carpels tapering into the short, subulate style. (Chap- 

 man's Flora of the Southern United States. See also Gray's Manual of the Bota7iy of the 

 Northern United States.) 



EDUM is a name used by Pliny and other old Roman 

 writers ; and Ainsworth and other lexicographers apply it 

 to our common Houseleek, — Sanpcrvivum tcctortcm. The old 

 English writers knew no difference between Scdiim and Scmpcr- 

 vivum; and Houseleeks and Stone-Crops, such as we under- 

 stand by Sempervivum and Scdum, were mixed together by them, 

 so far as these Latin names are concerned, although they had 

 a separate place in their works for Houseleeks, as distinct from 

 what they thought Stone-Crops to be. This litde piece of 

 history is important in connection with the origin of the name 

 Scdum, which all our text-books tell us is from scdco, the Latin 

 verb " to sit," and is supposed to have been given to these plants 

 from the habit of growing on bare rocks, sitting, as it were, o-- 

 them ; but we must remember that the name is a very old one, 

 and was merely adopted by Linnaeus, because he found it in 

 connection with these plants. We must suppose that there was 

 nothing particularly novel in a plant seeming to sit down, as if it 

 had no roots, for there are many plants which would convey the 

 impression of sitting down quite as vividly, if not more so, than 



