46 SWISS FLOWERS. 



good example. It is very commonly found in waste places, 

 running along the ground, its leaves being of a silvery white- 

 ness at the back. One of the points to be noticed is 

 whether the leaves have this whiteness, some of the species 

 being distinguished for it, others being green on both sides. 

 Then we have leaves with five or seven divisions, and, again, 

 those with three. Of this last, P. fragariastrum, our white 

 Barren Strawberry, one of the earliest flowers on our 

 banks, is a good representative. 



These divisions may afford a little help in determining a 

 plant among the twenty or thirty species of Potentillas given 

 by Swiss botanists. The family generally has about twenty 

 stamens, rather fewer than others of its tribe ; it is distin- 

 guished by its kind of double calyx, which has divisions 

 twice the number of the petals. They are, in most of the 

 species, five ; sometimes, as we have said, four. The seed 

 has no plume to it, and does not become a fruit, like the 

 Strawberry, which grows often so near it on the bank or 

 hill-side. 



P. aurea (Fig, 29), possibly the same that is called 

 P. crocea, may be recognised by its bright, almost orange, 

 yellow, and by having a yet deeper crocus-yellow spot at the 

 base of each petal. The petals, smaller near the base, 

 afterwards spread out and touch each other. The root- 

 leaves have five divisions, those up the stem three, the 

 under nerves of the leaf and its edges have rather a silvery 



