372 



2. POLEMONIUM C^RULEUM. 



BLUE GREEK VALERIAN. 



This genus contains plants of the fibrous-rooted, herbaceous 

 flowering perennial kind. 



It belongs to the class and order Pentandria Monogyina, and ranks 

 in the natural order oi' Campanacea:. 



Tlie characters arc: that the calyx is a one-leafed perianth, half- 

 five-cleft, inferior, goblet-shaped, acute, permanent: the corolla one- 

 petalled, wheel-shaped: tube shorter than tiie calyx, closed by five 

 valves placed at the top: border five-parted, wide, flat; segments 

 roundish, blunt: the stamina have five filaments, inserted into the 

 valves of the tube, filiform, shorter than the corolla, inclining: 

 anthers roundish, incumbent: the pistillum is an ovate, acute, supe- 

 rior germ: style filiform, the length of the corolla: stigma trifid, 

 revolute: the pericarpium is a three-cornered capsule, ovate, three- 

 celled, three-valved, opening three ways at top, covered: partitions 

 contrary to the valves: the seeds very many, irregular, sharpish. 



The species are: 1. P. ccenileum. Common Polemonium; 2. P. 

 reptans, Creeping Polemonium, or Greek Valerian. 



The first has a perennial, fibrous root: the herb smooth; the 

 stems upright, rising to the height of eighteen or twenty inches, 

 seldom more, leafy, panicled: the leaves alternate, unequally pin- 

 nate, many-paired; leaflets elliptic-lanceolate, quite entire: the 

 corolla between bell-shaped and wheel-shaped, blue: the calyx 

 bell-shaped, half-five-cleft: the filaments dilated at the base and 

 membranaceous: capsule clothed with the calyx, ovate-globular, 

 obsolelely three-grooved, thin, subpcllucid: seeds six in each cell, in 

 a double row, fastened to the inner angle of the cell, variously an- 

 gular, eroded on the surface, of a dark rust colour. It is a native of 

 Asia, flowering in May. 



