56 ENGLISH BOTANY. 



mucilage, and the root is rather farinaceous. When dried, the roots, boiled in water, 

 yield a line red colour, which may be used as a dye. The juice of the leaves also will 

 curdle milk, as well as rennet, and in some countries is used instead of it for that 

 purijose. The salt of sorrel, binoxalate of potash, is much used for bleaching straw 

 and removing ink stains from linen, and is often sold in the shops under the 

 name of " essential salt of lemons." Its poisonous qualities are not commonly knoAvn, 

 or doubtless it would often be substituted for oxalic acid. Dr. Taylor, in his work on 

 PoisoTis, relates three cases of poisoning with this substance, two of Avhich proved 

 fatal. In one of the latter, a lady took by mistake half an ounce of the salts of sorrel, 

 instead of cream of tartar. She had scarcely swallowed the draught, when she was 

 seized with violent pain and conv-ulsions, and died in eight minutes. The substance 

 for which this poisonous salt is most likely to be mistaken is the bitartrate of potash, 

 or cream of tartar. Lime water furnishes a ready means of distinguishing these two 

 salts. It precipitates both of them white, but the precipitate from the bitartrate of 

 potash is redissolved on adding to it a small quantity of a solution of tartaric acid, 

 while that from the binoxalate is not redissolved. It may be as well to mention 

 another simple means of distinction — the colour of ink is immediately discharged by 

 wai'ming it with a few grains of binoxalate, but is unaffected by the bitartrate of potash. 



SPECIES XV,— RUM EX ACETOSELLA. Linn. 

 Plate MCCXXTY. 

 Billot, Fl. Gall, et Germ. Exsicc. No. 2133. 



Leaves rather thin, slightly succulent, the radical ones elliptical 

 or oblong- elliptical or strapshaped-hastate, with the basal lobes long, 

 widely diverging or divaricate, often curving towards the apex of the 

 leaf, rarely absent ; stem leaves similar but smaller and on shorter 

 stalks ; the uppermost ones sessile and amplexicaul. Ochre^e laciniate, 

 silvery. Branches of the panicle rather numerous, erect or ascending- 

 erect, leafless. Pedicels about as long as the fruit petals, articulated 

 immediately below the calyx, spreading half-way round the stem. 

 Flowers dioecious. Sepals ajiplied to the base of the fruit petals. 

 Petals scarcely enlarged in fruit, subherbaceous, coloured, roundish 

 oval, truncate-wedgeshaped at the base, obtuse, entire, not extending 

 beyond the nut, not reticulated, without tubercles, but with the 

 midribs slightly thickened at the base. Leaves acid, dull green, not 

 glaucous. 



On heaths, in meadows, pastures, waste places, cultivated ground, 

 &c. Very common, and generally distributed. 



England, Scotland, Ireland. Perennial. Spring, Summer. 



Rootstock creeping. Stems numerous, slender, generally decumbent 

 at the base, then erect, *2 inches to 2 feet high, slightly branched or 

 nearly- simple up to the panicle. Radical leaves on long petioles; the 

 lamina \ to 2 inches long, varying very much in breadth, generally 



