oor 
LEGUMINIFERX. STS) 
inch long, brown when ripe, straight on the upper suture, gently 
curved on the lower, truncate- rounded at the apex, with an apiculus 
at the extremity of the upper suture, dehiscing for the greater part 
of its length. Seeds smooth, ovoid-compressed, reddish-brown, or 
pale olive with dark elongated blotches. Plant greyish-green, 
labrous, with sometimes a few hairs on the calyces. 
This plant bears no resemblance to any British species, except 
Trifolium subterraneum, but it may be readily distinguished from 
that plant by being smaller, glabrous, with the petals free, inclining 
to flesh-colour instead of straw-colour; by the absence of barren 
calyces when in fruit, and by the long, exserted, many-seeded pod. 
T. ornithopodioides accords ill with the other species of the genus 
Trigonella, which have the keel so minute that the flowers appear, 
on a cursory examination, to have only 3 petals; but it agrees still 
worse with the genus Trifolium, from which it is separated by its 
free petals, caducous corolla, and much exserted dehiscent many- 
seeded pod. From Medicago, in which Fries places it, by its less 
compressed and nearly straight pod, and the less compressed seeds 
not unequal at the hilum. Probably it ought to be placed ina 
genus by itself, as proposed by the late Dr. Bromfield. 
Birds’ Foot, Fenugreek. 
French, Z'rigonelle Pied df Oiseau. 
This species is placed in the same genus as the T'riyonella Fanum grecum, the 
Common Fenugreek, which was formerly cultivated by the Romans, and is still employed 
in the agriculture of the South of Europe. The seeds have a medical reputation not as 
given internally, but as poultices, fomentations, and emollient applications. ‘An old 
remedy in the Pharmacopeia oleum e mucilaginibus contained these seeds, but they are 
now no longer used except by grooms and farriers in veterinary medicine. 
GENUS IX¥.—TRIFOLIUM. Zinn. 
Calyx bell-shaped or tubular, 5-toothed; teeth elongate, gene- 
rally unequal. Corolla persistent and withering, sometimes 
retaining its form but becoming scarious after flowering; more 
rarely deciduous; petals usually united; standard scarcely spread- 
ing, equalling or exceeding the wings and keel; wings free at 
the apex, often divermine & keel obtuse. Stamens diadelphous, 
more or less adhering to the petals; filaments slightly thickened 
towards the apex. Style filiform, glabrous. Stigma terminal, 
capitate. Pod short, sessile and included in the tube of the calyx, 
or stipitate and slightly exserted, ovoid, not compressed, 1- to 4- 
seeded, often indehiscent. 
Herbs with the leaves digitately-trifoliate (rarely pinnately- 
trifoliate), the leaflets often toothed, and the stipules adnate. 
