PARSLEY FAMILY 



199 



and inconspicuous heads of a few, minute flowers, which never rise 

 above the leaves, and require a close search to be detected at all. — 

 Marshes and bogs ; common. — Fl. May — August. Perennial. 



2. Eryngium (Eryngo). — Stiff, branched, often glaucous plants ; 

 leaves reduced to spinous sheaths ; flcnvers sessile, in dense heads 

 with a spinous i7ivoluLre ; fruit covered with chaffy scales. (Name 

 of uncertain etymology.) 



1. E, viaritiinum (Sea Holly, 

 Sea Eryngo). — A stout, stiff, 

 prickly, glaucous plant, with 

 more of the habit of a Thistle 

 than of the Order to which it 

 belongs. The large, fleshy, 

 brittle rhizomes extend several 

 feet into the sand. The stems 

 are trichotomous and often pros- 

 trate ; flowers grey - blue. — 

 Sandy sea -shores ; frequent. 

 The rhizomes used formerly to 

 be candied as a sweetmeat. — Fl. 

 July, August. Perennial. 



2. E. campestre{¥\Q\di Eryngo), 

 a taller, more erect, more slender, 

 more branched and less glaucous 

 species, with pinnatifid leaves, 

 occurs on waste ground and 

 ballast-heaps ; but is very rare. — 

 Fl. July, August. Perennial. 



*3. AsTRANTiA. — Erect 

 plants ; leaves palmatilid ; umbels 

 simple or irregularly compound, 

 with involucres of large, simple 

 bracts^ which are often coloured ; 

 pink, with a long inflexed point 



toothed ridges and no vittae. (Name from the Greek astron^ a 

 star, from the star-like involucres.) 



I.* A. major (Greater Astrantia). — Stem i — 2 feet; leavei 

 3 — 7-lobed, serrate, with bristly teeth ; bracts ovate-lanceolate, 

 white below, green tinged with pink above : flowers white or pink. 

 Naturalised in woods near Ludlow and Malvern. — Fl. June — 

 August. Perennial. 



4. SANfcULA (Sanicle). — Slender, erect plants ; leaves palmately- 



SANICULA EUROP.tA (}Vood Sanicle). 



sepals leafy ; petals white or 

 fruit ovoid with 5 wrinkled 



