PLATE XL VIII. 



1. SYMPHYTUM ORIENTALS. 



EASTERN COMFREY. 



THIS genus contains plants of the hardy herbaceous perennial 

 kind. 



It belongs to the class and order Petandria Monogynia, and ranks 

 i the natural order of Asperifolice. 



The characters are: that the calyx is a five-parted perianth, 

 erect, five-cornered, acute, permanent: the corolla one-petalled, 

 bell-shaped: tube very short: border tubular-bellying, a little thicker 

 than the tube: mouth five-toothed, obtuse, reflexed: throat fenced 

 by five lanceolate rays, spinulose at the edge, shorter than the bor- 

 der, converging into a cone: the stamina have five awl-shaped fila- 

 ments, alternate with the rays of the throat; anthers acute, erect, 

 covered: the pistillum is as four germs: style filiform, length of the 

 corolla: stigma simple: there is no pericarpium: calyx larger, 

 widened: seeds four, gibbous, acuminate, converging at the tips. 



The species cultivated are: 1. S. officinale, Common Comfrey: 

 2. S. ttif/erosum, Tuberous-rooted Comfrey ; 3. S. orientate, Oriental 

 Comfrey. 



The first has a perennial root, fleshy, externally black; the stem 

 two or three feet high, upright, leafy, winged, branched at the top, 

 clothed with short bristly hairs that point rather downward: the 

 leaves waved, pointed, veiny, rough; the radical ones on footstalks, 

 and broader than the rest; the clusters of flowers in pairs on a 

 common stalk, with an odd flower between them, recurved, dense, 

 hairy: the corolla yellowish-white, sometimes purple: the rays 

 downy at each edge. It is a native of Europe and Siberia. 



