252 ORD. XIII. Campanacece. VIOLA ODORATA, 
Ess, Gen. Ch, Cal. 5-phyllus, Cor. 5-petala, irregularis, postice 
cornuta. Caps. supera, 3-valvis, 1 1-locularis. 
Sp. Ch. V. acaulis, fol. cordatis: stolonibus reptantibus. 
THE root is perennial, knobbed, whitish, and furnished with | 
long fibres: the leaves are heart-shaped, veined, crenated, or slightly 
scolloped at the edges, on the upper side smooth, and of a shining 
green colour, underneath paler, somewhat hairy, and stand upon 
long smooth footstalks: the stipule are membranous, lance-shaped, 
minutely serrated, and chiefly produced from the root: the pedun- 
cles.are usually about four inches long, and somewhat above the 
middle furnished with two pointed bractex, below which the pe- 
. duncle is quadrangular, but above it is grooved on the back, bent 
downwards at the top, and supports a single flower: the calyx is 
composed of five leafits, persistent, oval, obtuse, protuberant at the 
base, and tinged with a dark purplish colour: the corolla consists 
of five irregular petals, of a bluish purple colour; the two lateral 
petals are iegded towards the base, and the claw of He undermost 
formed into a horn-shaped nectarium > the “are very 
short: the antherz are bilocular, slightly joined together, yellowish, 
and terminated by an oval membrane of an orange colour: from 
behind two of the anthere there arises a flat greenish appendage, 
which is inserted in the nectarium: the germen is orbicular: the 
style twisted, and supplied with a hooked stigma: the capsule ‘is 
-roundish, compressed, separated by three valves, and contains several 
roundish light-coloured seeds, It iscommon near warm hedges, and 
on ditch banks, and flowers in March and April. 
This species of violet may be distinguished from the Viola hirta, 
to which it bears a great resemblance, by the latter having its leaves 
and footstalks beset with small hairs; by not sending off creeping 
shoots which strike root ; by its flowers being inodorous, and of a 
fainter blue colour; and by the bractez being placed somewhat 
below the middle of the scapus or peduncle.* 
» This last circumstance was i noticed by Mr. Curtis, who introduced it inte 
the specific character. 
