COMPOUND FLOWERS 133 



expenses of Henry VIII. in 1530 we find that the gardener at York Place 

 received a reward for " bringing Inttuze and cherries to Hampton Court." 

 Gerarde in 1597 mentions eight varieties as being then in cultivation. 

 Spenser speaks of 



"Cold lettuce and refreshing rosniarine." 



Our wild Lettuces are never now cultivated for food, and it would need a 

 long course of culture ere their acrid principles could be removed. The 

 varieties, L. sativa, crisjxt, perSnnis, quercina, and a few others, are those 

 commonly reared in the kitchen garden. 



3. Least Lettuce (L. saligna). — Upper leaves narrow, entire, pointed, 

 arrow-shaped at the base ; lower leaves pinnatifid ; beak twice as long as the 

 fruit ; root biennial. This rare plant is found chiefly in the south-eastern 

 parts of England, on chalky places near the sea, or in salt marshes. It has a 

 slender wavy stem, slightly branched, and about two feet high ; and the 

 plant has at first sight somewhat the appearance of a small osier : hence its 

 name. It bears, in July and August, small heads of yellow flowers in alter- 

 nate tufts, forming long clusters, which are so dense as to resemble spikes. 



* * Beak short ; heel of leaves smooth. 



4. Ivy-leaved Lettuce [L. murdlis). — Leaves pinnatifid, somewhat lyre- 

 shaped, and toothed ; the terminal lobe largest and angled ; beak much 

 shorter than the fruit ; root perennial. This is the most common of our wild 

 Lettuces, and is not unfrequent in woods or on old walls. It is a slender 

 plant, having a stem one or two feet high, with small yellow heads, each of 

 which has five regular florets, so that it resembles a simple flower of five 

 petals. It is in blossom from June to August. The stalks of the clusters 

 grow in a very angular direction, and the fruit is black. It has less narcotic 

 principle in its juices than either of the other species. 



The French call the Lettuce La Laitue, the Germans Der Salat. It is the 

 Salade of the Dutch, the Lattuga of the Italians, and the Lechuga of the 

 Spaniards. The greater number of the Lettuce family grow wild in Europe, 

 a lesser number in Asia and Africa, very few in America, and none in the 

 southern hemisphere. 



8. Blue Sow-thistle (Mulgedium). 



Alpine Blue Sow-thistle (M. alpinum). — Leaves lyre-shaped, arrow- 

 shaped at the base ; terminal lobe very large, triangular, halberd-shaped, and 

 acute ; stem unbranched ; heads of flowers in racemes ; bracts, flower-stalks, 

 and involucres with glandular hairs ; fruit ribbed. Few of our native lovers 

 of flowers ever look upon this beautiful plant, save in the herbarium of one 

 who has Avandered among the rare and lovely blossoms which grow on the 

 highland heights of North Britain. A few spots near rivulets in Forfar and 

 Aberdeen are its only British localities ; but in some countries at the north 

 of Europe it is a frequent plant. In Lapland, where it grows among the 

 trees on the slopes of mountains, it is called Terja, and its milky stem is 

 peeled off" and eaten raw by the people of those regions. It is intensely 

 bitter, but the Laplanders, accustomed to eat it from childhood, relish it 

 exceedingly. Some of them, however, told Linnaus, that when first they 



