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stem and foliage, and the exposed mature fruit, are more or less cha- 

 racteristic of the typical Chenopodium album. In the dung-hill 

 and green-leaved plants, the entire perianth appears to turn whitish 

 brown, and dies off without exposing the fruit ; which latter assumes 

 the opaque, grayish appearance much later than the fruit of the rosy- 

 leaved plants ; and its pericarp, when hardened and dull, is more 

 readily removed. 



There is a variety of Chenopodium album, growing in garden- 

 grovmds, amongst potatoes and other vegetables, which presents 

 various colours about the stem, and margins of the leaves, and is 

 more particularly red or purplish about the base of the stem and 

 branches. The plants of this form branch but little in the lower part, 

 though they attain the height of three feet, or more. The upper part 

 of these weeds is conspicuous at a distance, with long, leafless 

 branches, bearing panicles of inflorescence ; the whole plant in habit 

 bearing a resemblance to Artemisia vulgaris : the abundant inflores- 

 cence attracting the attention, by its excess over the foliage, as in the 

 last-named plant. The leaves of this variety correspond with those 

 of the corn-field plants, excepting in size, and in the lower ones being 

 distantly dotted on the upper surface with mealy points. The early 

 condition of the fruit has the seed microscopically punctate ; but J 

 have had no opportunity of observing the fruit when fully ripe, 

 because these larger things are, sooner or later, exterminated by the 

 gardeners. The corn-field plants, on the contrary, are more secure 

 from mvasion, being protected by the respect shown to the crop under 

 whose shadow they grow. Thus it is that they are allowed to remain 

 undisturbed until the harvest operations begin, at which period their 

 fruit is mostly perfected. 



In the punctulation of the seed, and in the shape of the fruit, the 

 typical Chenopodium album approaches Chenopodium ficifolium, 

 with which latter plant I confess myself at first to have confounded 

 it ; but, independently of the difference of foliage, the fruit of C. fici- 

 folium is much smaller than that of C. album. 1 am not able, at pre- 

 sent, to affirm that all the forms of Chenopodium album have the 

 seeds striated and minutely dotted, as are those of the typical form ; 

 but I nevertheless believe that the dots and markings are not so per- 

 ceptible in the seeds of the dung-hill form of C. album ; for although 

 our descriptive writers have varied in their characters of the seed of 

 Chenopodium album, none of them mention the seeds as being 

 minutely punctulate. 



