212 TETRANDRIA— MONOGYNIA. Exacum. 



Nat. Ord. Rotacea. Linn. 20. Gentiance. Juss. 46. Gen- 

 tianece. Br. Prodr. 449. See rc. 134, 135. 



Cal. inferior, of 1 leaf, divided about half way down into 4 

 equal, acute, simple segments, permanent. Cor. of 1 petal; 

 tube swelling, the length of the calyx ; limb in 4 deep, 

 spreading, equal segments, imbricated in the bud. Filam. 

 from the tube of the cor. between the segments of the 

 limb, and much shorter, thread-shaped, nearly equal, 

 erect. Anth. roundish-oblong, of 2 cells. Germ, oval, 

 superior. Style terminal, thread-shaped, a little incli- 

 ning, as long as the limb, permanent. Stigma capitate, 

 undivided. Caps?de filling the tube of the cor. which 

 gradually enlarges with it, elliptical, compressed, of 2 

 valves with inflexed edges, imperfectly dividing it into 2 

 cells. Seeds numerous, small, rough, attached to a fixed, 

 or finally separated, double receptacle. 



Herbaceous, smooth, intensely bitter. Leaves simple, entire, 

 and as well as the branches, or Jlower-stalks, opposite. Fl. 

 terminal, generally yellow. 



1. ¥i.filifo7*me. Least Gentianella. 



Leaves sessile. Stem thread-shaped, forked. Flowers on 

 long stalks. 



E.filiforme. H.Br. 182. Engl.Bot.v.4. t.235. With.]94. Willd. 

 Sp. PL v. 1 . 638. Ait. Hort. Kew. ed. 2. v. 1 . 250. Hook. Lond. 

 fasc.2. 91. *. 86. " DeCand. Fr. ed.3. v. 3. 663." 



Gentiana filiformis. Linn. Sp. PL 335. Huds. 103. FLDan.t.324. 

 Ehrh. Phyt. 43. 



Centaurium palustre luteum minimum nostras. Rati Syn. 286. 

 Vaill. Par. 32. t.6.f.3. 



On sandy or turfy bogs. 



In Dorsetshire, Cornwall, Devonshire and Sussex, not very un- 

 common. In Dursey island, Cork, Ireland ; Mr. Blashford. 

 Wade PL Rar. Hib. 1 1 . 



Annual. July. 



Root small, fibrous. Stem 2—4 inches high, erect, round, slender, 

 branched from the bottom, more or less forked. Leaves chiefly 

 radical, lanceolate or spatulate, single-ribbed, not an inch long. 

 FL small, yellow, erect, stalked, solitary at the end of each 

 branch. 



The structure of the receptacles appears somewhat different from 

 Mr. Brown's idea of what is strictly proper to Exacum ; but, as 

 Linnaeus observes, there are few genera in which some part or 

 other of the fructification is not various, or liable to exceptions ; 

 a principle very judiciously kept in view by our learned country- 

 man in the following genus. 



