ROSE TRIBE 221 



" make a merry heart," for which purpose leaves and flowers were to be used. 

 It cured, besides, so many forms of sickness, that ho must indeed have been 

 in evil case who was like one whom Chaucer described — 



" Ne drinke of herbes may beu his helping." 



2. Common Dropwort {S. filip6ndula). — Herbaceous ; leaves pinnate, 

 with alternately smaller leaflets ; leaflets all oblong, deeply cut and serrate ; 

 flowers in a panicled cyme. Plant perennial. We do not find this flower in 

 company with the last species, for it thrives in places too dry for the Meadow- 

 sweet, and occurs on pastures where the soil is of chalk or gravel. It usually 

 grows on a stem about a foot in height ; and its flowers, which expand from 

 July to September, form a smaller and flatter tuft, and are individually 

 larger and whiter than those of the Meadow-sweet. Before expansion, they 

 are of a beautiful deep rose-colour, and, mingling with the fully blown and 

 snowy blossoms, are very pretty, but they are not fragrant. The leaf is 

 altogether different, too ; for it is cut into many fine segments, and is of a 

 rich dark green. 



3. Willow-leaved Spiraea (»S'. salicifdlia). — Shrubby; leaves oval, 

 somewhat lanceolate, unequally serrated, smooth; flowers in dense, erect, 

 terminal racemes. Plant perennial. This species, with its willow-like leaves, 

 is not truly wild, but is naturalized in several woods in the North of England 

 and Scotland, and is especially common in North Wales. Its clusters of 

 rose-coloured or flesh-coloured flowers are found in July, and, though com- 

 pact, look very light, from the circumstance of the numerous stamens being 

 longer than the petals. The shrub is so often planted in gardens and 

 shrubberies, that it is doubtless, in many cases, an outcast from some cultured 

 spot. Several species of the genus are ornamental shrubs, and the Siberian 

 Spirsea {S. Icevigata) has fragrant leaves, which form a tolerable substitute for 

 tea. 



3. Mountain Avens (Dryas). 



White Mountain Avens {D. odopitala). — Leaves oblong, deeply 

 cut with roundish serrated notches ; sepals three or four times as long as 

 broad, more or less pointed ; petals 8. Plant perennial. This is not a 

 common plant, for it belongs chiefly to the mountainous regions of England, 

 Scotland, and Ireland, growing especially on limestone soils ; in the west and 

 north of Ireland, however, it grows near to the sea-level. It may easily be 

 known from any other plant of the order by its oblong, deeply-cut evergreen 

 leaves, on stalks, which are quite white on the under surface with thick 

 woolly down. The woody stem is like those of mountain flowers in general, 

 raised but a small height from the ground, or lying upon it. The large 

 white blossoms unfold in June and July. The Germans call the plant Silber- 

 kraiit, the French Lriade, the Dutch Hertenkruid, and in Iceland it is termed 

 Holta-soleyg. 



This Avens has all the usual characteristics of plants which grow on 

 mountain heights. The large blossoms and short stems would at once suggest 

 to those accustomed to elevated regions that this was a mountain flower. 

 Alpine plants grow more socially than almost any others, so that one kind of 



