154 ENGLISH BOTANY. 



but remark how great is the variety of vegetable food employed in the cookery of our 

 continental neighbours, who are certainly more disposed than ourselves to avail 

 themselves of the natural productions of their country. 



SPECIES II.— S O N C H U S AS PER. Hoffm. 



Plates DCCCXI. DCCCXIL 



Billot, Fl. Gall, et Germ. Exsicc. No. 1912. 



Eeich. Ic. Fl. Germ, et Helv. Vol. XIX. Tab. MCCCCX. Fig. 2. 



S. oleraceus y et I asper, Linn. Sp. Plant, p. 1117. 



S. fallax, Wallr. Sched. Crit. p. 432. 



Annual, with radical leaves. Stem branched. Leaves slightly 

 rugose, obovate, undivided or pinnatifid or runcinate-pinnatifid, 

 undulated and spinous - dentate or dentate, amplexicaul with 

 blunt adpressed auricles. Anthodes in an irregular umbel. Phyl- 

 laries glabrous. Achenes compressed, longitudinally ribbed, but 

 not transversely wrinkled. 



In cultivated ground, road-sides, and waste places. Very 

 common, and generally distributed. 



England, Scotland, Ireland. Summer and Autumn. 



Extremely like S. oleraceus, with which it is reunited by 

 Mr. Bentham ; and, were it not for the smoothness of the fruit 

 between the ribs, it would be impossible to consider it more than a 

 sub-species. The leaves are more often undivided, more rugose, 

 from the veins being more deeply impressed on the upper surface ; 

 the margins are more or less waved, sometimes to a very con- 

 siderable extent; the teeth are more acute, closer together, and 

 often so firm as to be almost spiny ; they are of a duller green, 

 and often decidedly glaucous ; when pinnatifid, the terminal lobe 

 is smaller in proportion, and the auricles of the leaves in the 

 middle of the stem are bent down and round, instead of remaining 

 in the same plane as the lamina of the leaf, so that when the 

 plant is once known, it can be recognized even when not in fruit. 



Rough Sow-thistle. 

 French, Laitron Rude. German, Rauche Saudistel. 



SPECIES III.— S ONCHUS ARVENSIS. Linn. 

 Plate DCCCXIII. 

 Billot, Fl. Gall, et Germ. Exsicc. No. 1256. 

 Reich. Ic. Fl. Germ, et Helv. Yol. XIX. Tab. MCCCCXII. 



Perennial, with radical leaves. Eootstock with very long slender 

 extensively creeping stolons. Stem simple, or nearly so, up to 

 the inflorescence. Lower leaves persistent, narrowly oblanceolate, 



