PLATE XXXVII. 



1. NIG ELLA DAMASCENA. 



LOVE IN A MIST. DEVIL IN A BUSH. 



This genus contains plants of the hardy herbaceous flowering 

 annual kind. 



It belongs to the class and ordev PoIi/an(h-ia Pentagt/nia, and ranks 

 in the natural order of Multisiliquce. 



The characters are: that there is no calyx: the corolla has five 

 petals, ovate, flat, blunt, spreading, more contracted at the base: 

 the nectaries eight, placed in a ring, very short; each two-lipped; 

 outer lip larger, loAveri bifid, flat, convex, marked with two dots; 

 inner lip shorter, narrower, from ovate ending in a line: the stamina 

 have numerous awl-shaped filaments, shorter than the petals. An- 

 thers compressed, blunt, erect: the pislillum has several germs (five 

 to ten), oblong, convex, compressed ; erect, ending in styles which 

 are awl-shaped, angular, very long, but revolute, permanent: stigmas 

 longitudinal, adnate: the pericarpium capsules as many, oblong, 

 compressed, acuminate, connected on the inside by the suture, gap- 

 ing on the inside at top : the seeds very many, angular, and 

 rugged. 



The species cultivated are: 1. A'^. damascena, Common Fennel- 

 flower; 2. N. sativa. Small Fennel-flower; 3. N. arvensis. Field Fen- 

 nel-flower; 4. N. Hispanica, Spanish Fennel-flower; 5. N. orkntalis. 

 Yellow Fennel-flower. 



The first rises with an upright branching stalk a foot and a half 

 high: the leaves much longer and finer than those of tlie third: the 

 flowers are large, pale blue, with a five-leaved involucre under each 

 longer than the flower; they are succeded by larger swelling seed- 



