THE BUTTERCUP FAMILY. 83 



anemone and the hellebore ; while in other cases the flower is curiously 

 spurred, or the upper sepal is converted into a hood. There are 

 examples of only three sepals, and of as many as nine or ten petals. 

 Stamens seated on the receptacle, five, ten, or twenty to a hundred or 

 more, the higher numbers predominating. Pistils one to a hundred, 

 the higher numbers again most usual, perfectly distinct, except in the 

 exotic genus Nigilla, where the ovaries are united. The fruit con- 

 sists in general either of many- seeded follicles, or of dry achenia, 

 which in the Clematis and others are provided with hairy tails. A 

 strong tendency to become double is manifested both in the regularly- 

 formed flowers and in the irregular. 



Natives principally of northern temperate latitudes, and adorning 

 them everywhere, from the beginning of spring till the end of summer, 

 with bright and copious bloom of every colour, few families are more 

 abundant than the Ranunculaceae, or do more for the embellishment 

 of their native soil. But alas for gay attire ; not a single species is fit 

 for food, or of other economic service, while their general properties 

 are caustic and poisonous. The spearwort and celery-crowfoot of our 

 ditches will blister the skin ; and the hellebores and the aconites, 

 taken internally, are fatal. None are worse in this respect than the 

 common purple monkshood, or Aconltum Napellus, (E. B., Supp. ii. 

 2730.) the roots of which, mistaken for horse-radish, have frequently 

 caused death. Notwithstanding its noxious qualities, this plant enjoys 

 a place in every flower-garden, and is not infrequently seen growing 

 even by the side of kitchen vegetables, where it should never be per- 

 mitted. Its tall panicles of irregular purple flowers, one of which is 

 represented in Fig. 51 (p. 25), last from early summer to October. 

 The leaf is represented in Fig. 30 (p 16). The properties in question 

 have given the family repute in medicine ; but although used from the 

 earliest times, few species appear to be really serviceable. 



A thousand species are known, thirty-two of them growing wild in 

 England, and nineteen in the neighbourhood of Manchester, the blos- 

 soms in every case regular, with flat or concave sepals and petals, 

 except in the columbine, where the latter resemble five little cornu- 

 copias. This species, the marsh-marigold, and the globe-flower, have 

 foUicles for their fruit, and the remainder small dry achenia. They 

 may be separated, for convenience of descriptive analysis, into those 

 that have yellow flowers, and those that are not yellow : — 



8 A 



