202 TYPES OF BRITISH PLANTS 
sible for the production of ipecacuanha, a medicine that 
used to be a good deal more prominent as a remedy for 
all juvenile complaints than, happily for the juveniles, 
it is now. 
Our last group includes the Buttercup tribe and the 
Water-lilies, and to it belong an extraordinarily varied 
assortment of plants, which set at nought all such ideas 
of strict adhesion to a conventional type as we found 
among the Crucifers. There is no fixed number, in many 
cases, ruling either petals or sepals, but they vary from 
flower to flower. Take, for instance, the Water-lilies 
which beautify our stagnant or slowly-running waters ; 
you will find the freest possible arrangement, and you will 
also find that the petals, arranged in spiral curve, slowly 
fade into stamens, having forms on the border-line of 
change which seem to partake of the character of both. 
In the same way the thick fleshy sepals pass gradually 
into petals with no definite border-line between them. 
The raft-like leaves, anchored by long and tough stalks to 
the mud beneath, let one know at once where to look for 
the plant; but our English leaves cannot compare with 
those of the grand Victoria regalis, which spread to a 
diameter of over six feet, their edges turned up like 
those of an enormous tea-tray, whilst their splendid rose 
and white flowers measure as much as fifteen inches 
across. 
Leaving the water-lilies, we come to the Crowfoot or 
Buttercup tribe, of which almost every individual has 
some striking feature. First comes the Wild Clematis, 
or Traveller’s Joy, or Old Man’s Beard, the long-feathered 
seed-vessels of which deck the hedges in autumn and 
winter. The greenish flowers (full of honey, as you will 
find it well to remember if you are a butterfly-hunter) 
