244 OCTANDRIA— TETRAGYNIA. Elatine. 



for who would have supposed so great a botanist could have 

 confounded it vpith Centunculus minimus, as is proved by his 

 herbarium at Oxford ! 

 At Mr. Forster's persuasion, I have, like Vaillant, separated this 

 from the true E. Hydropiper of Linnaeus ; which is Vaillant's t. 2. 

 f. 2, a larger plant, with smooth leaves, and 4-cleft, octandrous, 

 white Jlowers, generally, if not always, growing entirely ander 

 water, and not yet observed in England, Ours may possibly be 

 E. triandrn of Schkuhr and Hoffmann ; but I have never seen 

 fewer than 6 stamens, and therefore their name is not unexcep- 

 tionable ; neither is their specific character, of the opposite 

 Jlowers, ever observable in English specimens. Linnaeus consi- 

 dered both Vaillant's plants as one species ; but, by his syno- 

 nyms in Fl. Suec. the Swedish plant is Vaillant's/. 2. Both are 

 preserved in his herbarium, but without any place of growth 

 attached to either. 



