420 CHENOPODIUM. L^i-ass v. order ii- 



with a mid-rib, and more mealy than the uppcv. Flowers very small, 

 in roundish oblong clusters, or small dense spikes, on short stalks, 

 arranged in leafless racemes. Perianth of five lanceolate segments, 

 rough, with mealiness, each with a green mid-rib. Stamens on slender 

 filaments, rather longer than the perianth, with small roundish two 

 lohed yellow anthers. Styles short, spreading. Fruit surrounded by 

 the persistent perianth. Seed shining black, closely invested by a thin 

 pale brown membrane, its testa very finely dotted, hard and crustaceous, 

 roundish, with the sides flattened. 



Habitat. — Waste places, especially rubbishy places near the sea. 



Annual ; flowering in August. 



The whole plant when bruised exhales an extremely nauseous odour, 

 something like that of putrid salt fish. It was much used at one time 

 in nervous and hysterical complaints, and supplies of it were always to 

 be obtained in Covent Garden Market ; but it is now superseded by 

 other and more convenient medicines. Messrs. Chevalier and Las- 

 seigne detected in this plant a quantity of ammonia, which is com- 

 bined with a portion of oil and resinous matter, on which depends the 

 intolerable odour exhaled by the plant. 



4. C. polysper'mum, Linn. (Fig. 480.) many seeded ^oosefnot. 

 Leaves ovate, entire, quite smooth ; racemes elongated, leafless ; peri- 

 anth spreading when in fruit ; seeds shining, very finely dotted. 



Hooker, British Flora, vol. i. p. 141. 



a, cymoso-racemosum. Stems all prostrate; leaves obtuse ; flowers 

 in a compound leafless cymose-racerae. 



C. polyspermum. English Botany, t. 1480. — English Flora, vol. ii. 

 p. 15. — Lindley, Synopsis, p. 216. 



^. spicato-racemoium. Stem erect; leaves acute; flowers leafless, 

 in a spicate raceme. 



C. acutifolium, Smith. English Botany, t. 1481. — English Flora, 

 vol. ii. p. 15. — Lindley, Synopsis, p. 216. — C, polyspermum, Curtis. 



Root tapering, branched, and fibrous. Stem erect, branched, and 

 spreading, or prostrate on the ground, leafy, roundish, or angular and 

 striated, varying from six to twenty inches in length, a smooth palish 

 green. Leaves alternate, on slender footstalks, smooth, paler beneath 

 than above, with a mid-rib and slender branched veins, ovate, ovatc- 

 oblong, acute, almost lanceolate, sometimes obtuse or roundish, but 

 generally with a fine or bristly point. Flowers very small, crowded in 

 small clusters, disposed on slender stalks, in more or less spicate or 

 racemose racemes, leafless, or sometimes with one or two small leaves 

 amongst them, one, two, or three racemes arising from the axis of the 

 leaves, and are either erect or spreading. Perianth of five ovate-oblong 

 or acute short segments, green, with pale memliranous edges. Stamens 

 with awl-shaped filaments, as long as the segments, and small yellow 



