POLEMONIACE^— JACOB'S LADDER TRIBE 245 



dividing the roots, and, once established, it is very difficult of extirpation. 

 The canals in some parts of Holland are covered with its bright yellow flowers. 

 It is also known as Limnanfhemum. peltatum. 



Order LVI. POLEMONIACEiE— JACOB'S LADDER 



TRIBE. 



Calyx deeply 5-cleft, not falling off; corolla regular, 5-lobed ; stamens 5, 

 from the middle of the tube of the corolla ; ovary 3-celled ; style single ; 

 stigma 3-cleft ; capsule 3-celled, 3-valved. This order consists of herbaceous 

 plants, often having handsome flowers, but possessing no important properties. 

 They are remarkable for the often blue colour of their pollen ; and several, 

 as the various species of Phlox, Gilia, and Coboea, adorn our gardens. 



Jacob's Ladder {Polemdnium). — Corolla wheel-shaped, with erect 

 lobes ; stamens bearded at the base ; cells of the capsule many-seeded. 

 Name, the Greek name of the plant. 



Jacob's Ladder (Polemdnium). 



Blue Jacob's Ladder, or Greek Valerian (P. cceruleum). — Stem 

 angular ; leaves smooth, pinnate ; leaflets egg-shaped, somewhat lanceolate ; 

 flowers in panicles ; perennial. This plant, though very common in gardens, 

 is rare in a wild state, and is chiefly found in the north of this kingdom. 

 Several of its localities in Scottish woods are recorded, but it is doubtful if it 

 is truly wild there, though on some banks and bushy spots of Yorkshire and 

 Derbyshire it appears to be really so. The stem is angular, about one or two 

 feet high, and its pinnated leaf suggested its name in days when men readily 

 traced in Nature some similarity to the objects and allusions of Holy Writ : — 



' ' And see of favour'd York the child, 

 Or Derby's mountain thickets wild, 

 The plant not strange to Scottish skies, 

 Whose leaflets, ladder-like, arise, 

 Pointing to azure vaults above — 

 The Patriarch's Dream — in southern grove 

 Infrequent." 



The flowers of this plant appear in June and July ; in colour they are 

 pale-blue or white, and of a delicate texture. The whole plant is somewhat 

 astringent, but has not the virtues which we might from its name expect. 

 Pliny relates of the Polemdnium., that it had also among the Greeks the name 

 Chilodynamia, on account of its excellent properties ; while the name by 

 which it is known to us is, according to his account, from polemos, war, 

 because two kings, having each claimed the merit of discovering the great 

 uses of the herb, had recourse to arms to settle the disputed question. But 

 every one conversant with the names of ancient writers is aware of the diffi- 

 culty of exactly ascertaining in some cases the plants intended. Professor 

 Burnett believes that the Marsh Polemonium of Hippocrates was the Gh'atiola, 

 or hedge hyssop, a plant possessing very active properties. The French call 

 our Jacob's Ladder La VctUriane Gn-ecque. It is the Speerlcraut of the Germans ; 

 the Spierkruid of the Dutch ; and the Polemonium of the Italians. 



