76 PRIMULACE^ 



if they be spread aln-oad, fair weather." Lord Bacon, too, who calls it 

 Winco-pijDe, noticed this peculiarity. Leyden thus alludes to the flower :— 



"Such is the science to tlie peasant dear, 

 Which guides his labour through the varying year, 

 "While he, ambitious 'mid his brother swains 

 To sliine the pride and wonder of the plains, 

 Can in the Pimpernel's red-tinted llowers, 

 As close their petals, read the measured hours." 



Not only does the Pimpernel shut up its blossoms during rainy and cloudy 

 weather, but it is one of the best of the Flora:, HoruJogica', opening its petals in our 

 latitude at about ten minutes past seven in the morning, and closing them a 

 few minutes after two in the afternoon. Therefore it is futile to consult the 

 Pimpernel as a barometer after 2 p.m. It is interesting to remark the regu- 

 larity with which some of the plants of our woods and fields fold or unfold 

 their blossoms. Who ever saw a goat's-beard open on a summer afternoon ? 

 Long before that part of the day it had gone to its daily sleep. Nor in 

 other climates are these peculiarities less frequent, for Dr. Seemann, the 

 naturalist, who accompanied Kellett's Arctic Expedition, mentions as a 

 curious fact the regular closing of the flowers during the long day of an 

 Arctic summei'. "Although," lie says, " the sun never sets while it lasts, the 

 plants make no mistake about the time, when if it be not night it ought to 

 be ; but regularly as the evening hours approach, and when a midnight sun 

 is several degrees above the horizon, they droop their leaves, and sleep even 

 as they do at sunset in more favoured climes." This naturalist adds, that if 

 ever man should reach the Pole, and be undecided which way to turn when 

 his compass has become sluggish and his timepiece out of order, the plants 

 which he may happen to meet with will shoAv him the way ; their sleeping 

 leaves tell him that midnight is at hand, and that at that time the sun is 

 standing in the north. 



Constant as are the flowers under their accustomed circumstances, yet 

 there are certainly cases in which, if unusual darkness come upon them, they 

 do, as Dr. Seemann expresses it, make " a mistake." Some years since, when 

 an eclipse of the sun brought darkness at mid -day, the author of these pages 

 went out to examine the flowers and leaves. Both were folded up just as at 

 midnight. Various species of garden convolvulus, the pheasant's-eye, and 

 several other flowers were quite closed, and daisies and marigolds had "gone 

 to bed with the sun." The leaves of lupins, and laburnums, and robinias all 

 hung drooping as at night-time, and as the darkness gradually disappeared, so 

 the flowers and leaves opened, and stood erect, as if to meet the dawn. 



The Pimpernel is bright scarlet, with a purple eye, and it is, with the 

 exception of the poppies, our only scarlet Avild-flower. The leaves are of a 

 somewhat sea-green hue, quite smooth, often marked on the luidcr side with 

 small black specks, and the stems are square, and very brittle. These are 

 about three or four inches long, and often lie close to the soil. The flowers 

 may be seen from May to November. The white variety, with a purple eye, 

 is a very pretty little flower. Mr. Dillwyn Llewellyn found it at Pennllogan, 

 in South Wales ; and we have several times found it near Chatham, in Kent, 

 both as a garden weed and in the cornfield. The Blue Pimpernel is of a rich 



