DICOTYLEDONS 



93 



Celery {Apium graveolens). — The wild plant is 

 also called Smallage. It is acrid, and should not be 

 eaten ; but it loses all deleterious properties, or 

 rather does not develop them, when it is blanched 

 under cultivation. In Malta it is always used green 

 for flavouring soups, etc. The wild plant has a 

 very strong smell of 

 celery, and can often be 

 detected by the odour, 

 even at some distance 

 off. It is more com- 

 mon near the sea, 

 though it occurs by ditches 

 inland. 



It is a plant with no 

 very marked feature by 

 which it can be distin- 

 guished, except the fami- 

 liar smell of celery when 

 bruised, and its umbels 

 have neither a general 

 involucre nor involucel. 



Water- Hemlock, or Cowbane {Cicuta virosd). 

 —This is a tall-growing plant, with long^ narrow 

 serrated segments to the compound leaves. The 

 flowers are white. There is no general involucre ; 

 but an involucel of many bracts is present. The 

 fruit has five scarcely prominent ridges. It fre- 

 quents watery places, as marshes and ditches. It 



Fig. 23. Cicuta virosa ; Water- 

 Hemlock, or Cowbane. 



