CLASS X. ORDER IV.] SEDUM. 663 



leafy; leaves fleshy, alternate, ovate, gibbous at the base; cyme 

 smooth, few flowered ; petals with a taperiug point, as long again as 

 the ovate calyx segments. 



English Botany, t. 171. —English Flora, vol. ii. p. 317.— Hooker, 

 British Flora, vol. i. p. 212.— Lindley, Synopsis, p. 64. 



Root small, fibrous. Stem round, smooth, slender, pale and glau- 

 cous, simple, erect, but mostly much branched from the base, the 

 branches spreading, procumbent and rooting, the barren branches 

 densely crowded with alternate leaves, especially towards the ends, into 

 a club-shape, two, three, or rarely four inches high. Leaves crowded, 

 alternate, ovate, obtuse, sessile, and spurred at the base, fleshy, smooth, 

 of a glaucous green, but sometimes like the branches of a reddish 

 colour. Inflorescence cymose, smooth, of two spreading branches, with 

 a solitary flower from the axis. Floivers few, nearly sessile. Calyx of 

 five oblong obtuse or acutely pointed segments. Petals five, lanceo- 

 late, with a narrow tapering point, white, or spotted with red, with a 

 purplish mid-rib, and mostly two lateral ones. IStamens on slender 

 Jllaments, a little shorter than the petals. Anthers roundish, kidney- 

 shaped, purple, of two cells. Styles with small stigmas, downy. 

 Capsules smooth. 



Habitats — Dry sandy and rocky places, especially near the sea ; 

 common in North Wales, most abundant in Scotland and Ireland. 



Annual ; flowering iu June and July. 



5. S. al'bum, Linn. (Fig. 755.) White Stonecrop. Stem erect, with 

 procumbent rooting branches ; leaves scattered, linear-oblong, sub- 

 cylindrical, obtuse, spreading; panicle smooth, sub-cymose, much 

 branched ; petals lanceolate, three times longer than the obtuse calyx 

 segments. 



English Botany, t. 1578, — English Flora, vol. ii. p. 320.— Hooker, 

 British Flora, vol. i. p, 212. — Lindley, Synopsis, p. 64. 



Root long, with slender branched fibres. Stem erect, from four to 

 six inches high, roundish, smooth, mostly of a purplish colour below, 

 with prostrate rooting branches. Leaves smooth, of a glaucous green, 

 rarely of a reddish colour, scattered, spreading, linear oblong, obtuse, 

 cylindrical, somewhat flattened on the upper side, sessile, from half to 

 an inch long. Injlorescence a smooth terminal much branched sub- 

 cymose panicle, of numerous crowded white or pale rose coloured 

 jiowersy each flower on a short footstalk. Calyx of five ovate obtuse 

 smooth segments. Petals thrice as long as the calyx, lanceolate, with 

 an acute or obtuse point, white or pale rose colour, with a slender 

 mid-rib. Stamens about as long as the petals, with slender filaments^ 

 and small roundish kidney-shaped anthers^ of a dark purplish colour. 

 Styles with small obtuse downy stigmas. Capsule smooth, membranous. 



Habitat. — Rocks, old walls, and roofs of houses ; rare. Kentish 

 Town and Bromley, Middlesex ; about Great Malvern, Worcestershire, 



