74 FLOWERS OF THE WOODS AND COPSES 
Vinca is the Pervinca of Pliny, and Periwinkle comes from this, 
the second Latin name denoting that it is smaller than the other 
Periwinkle. 
The plant is called Blue Buttons, Dicky Dilver, Ground Ivy, Peri- 
winkle, Sen Green. It was supposed to inspire love, and called Death's 
flower, being scattered over the graves of children in Italy and 
Tuscany. It was said to signify early recollections or pleasures of 
memory. Rousseau was struck with their appearance in a hedge 
when going to Charmattes, and thirty years afterwards, in company 
with Mme De Staél he saw the flower, and it reminded him of the 
occasion again. It is much cultivated in gardens and shrubberies. 
ESSENTIAL SPECIFIC CHARACTERS :— 
208. Vinca minor, L.—Stem procumbent, wiry, with erect leafy 
shoots, leaves lanceolate, margins smooth, flowers blue, solitary. 
Lungwort (Pulmonaria officinalis, L.) 
Not being native in this country, Lungwort is not found in any 
early deposits. It is a member of the Northern Temperate Flora of 
Europe. It is not an indigenous plant, and is regarded by Watson as 
an introduction in the thirty odd counties in which it occurs in S. Scot- 
land and England. 
Everywhere it is rare and merely naturalized, having escaped from 
cultivation in the garden, and it is usually found in copses and similar 
woodland habitats close to houses, by the owners of which, in the 
first instance, it has been dispersed by planting with other plants, 
such as Periwinkle, Spurge Laurel, and some others equally under 
suspicion. 
The name Lungwort, translated from the first Latin name, refers 
to a character of the leaves, which have a spotted appearance. It is 
an erect, hairy, slender-stemmed plant with alternate leaves, the radical- 
leaves being egg-shaped or heart-shaped, rough, the stem-leaves stalk- 
less and egg-shaped. The leaves are spotted with pale-green patches 
about a quarter of an inch across. 
The flowers are pale purple or pink, and of two forms, long- and 
short-styled, the short-styled form having larger flowers. The flower- 
stalks are simple and the flowers in terminal forked cymes. The calyx 
is as long as the straight tube of the corolla. The corolla, first pink 
(like others), turns blue later, hence the flowers present a variegated 
appearance, 
The stem is 1 foot high. The Lungwort flowers in May and June. 
