78 PRIMULACE.^ —PRIMROSE TRIBE 



who were pleased to term the blue-flowered variety the female, and the red 

 the male Imperial Pimpernel. Pliny had a notion that sheep avoided the Blue 

 and ate the Scarlet Pimpernel, which he, with some reason, regards as a very 

 strange circumstance, because, as he says, the plants are alike in all save the 

 colour of the flowers. He adds, that if by mistake the sheep cropped the 

 Blue Pimpernel, they sought forthwith for a plant which he names, but 

 which modern botanists cannot identify. 



The French call our pretty little floAver Mouron ; the Germans, Gaiichheil ; 

 the Dutch, G-uicJielheil ; the Italians, Anagdlide : the Russians term it 

 Kurjatschja noga iraioli. 



2. Bog Pimpernel {A. tenMla). — Stem creeping ; leaves egg-shaped, or 

 roundish, stalked ; flower-stalks longer than the leaves ; petals entire, much 

 longer than the calyx; perennial. All botanists enjoy wandering over a 

 bog, for there may be seen some of the choicest gems of our native flora. 

 The Bog Pimpernel is a not vnifrequent plant thei-e, its delicate rose-coloured 

 flower peeping up in June and July from among the turf, and making Avith 

 the moss a beautiful carpet. The blossoms are not much like those of the 

 Pimpernel of the corn-field, but look at first like tiny convolvuluses, seated 

 on a stalk no thicker than a sewing-thread, about four inches long, with 

 leaves so small that a whole spray of them might lie beneath a sixpenny- 

 piece. The segments of the blossom are seldom so expanded as to become 

 tpiite flat, but are more often erect, and appearing as if not fully blown. 

 The plant sometimes grows on the borders of rivulets. 



8. Chaffweed {Cenfi'inculm). 



Small Chaffweed, or Bastard Pimpernel {C. mimmvs). — Leaves 

 egg-shaped, alternate, acute, and smooth ; flowers nearly sessile, axillary, 

 and solitary ; annual. This is among the smallest, perhaps quite the 

 smallest, of all our wild-flowers. It is not very common, and is doubtless 

 sometimes overlooked on the moist gravelly spots on which it grows. It is 

 found in various places, as in some parts of Norfolk, about London, on 

 Brabourne and Willesbro' Leas, in Kent, and on some wet sandy places in 

 Hampshire and other counties ; as well as in the south of Ireland, and the 

 Lowlands of Scotland. It has something the appearance of a stunted Pim- 

 pernel. Its minute flowers are pink or white, but never very bright. They 

 expand in June and July. The stem is sometimes branched, but more often 

 it is simple, and bears about six or eight alternate leaves, among which are 

 placed about the same number of little blossoms. The French call the 

 Chaflweed Cenfenille bassetfe, the Germans, Centunkel, and the Dutch, Zeer 

 Klein guichelmuur. The species seems to grow throughout Europe, and may 

 or may not be the Ceiduncnlus of the Romans, which was, however, apparently 

 a plant of cultivated grounds. 



9. Brookweed (Sdmolus). 



Brookweed, or Water Pimpernel (.S'. ralerdndi). — Leaves blunt, 

 racemes many-flowered ; flower-stalks with a small bract ; perennial. This 

 Brookweed grows in damp and watery places, especially where the soil is of 

 gravel, but it is not frequent. The rounded seem is about eight or ten 



