NOVEMBER. 19 



!V. Chantredi-ys) and . Brooklime (F. Beccabunga) still 

 retain their high specialisation. It was probably their 

 beauty and their open face which suggested to Tournefort 

 their generic name. 



Mediaeval legend tells how, when the Saviour was toiling 

 along to the hill of Crucifixion, bearing His cross, a com- 

 passionate woman whose house He was passing, pitying 

 the worn sufferer, wiped His face with a napkin, and how 

 on the cloth was found the impress of the divine features. 

 She treasured the sacred representation, the Vera Eikon or 

 true image, as it was termed in the hybrid Latin-Greek of 

 the early Christian ages. Then by a common conceit she 

 came to be known by an inversion of these words as Veron- 

 ica, and by this name she was canonised. So the botanist, 

 seeing the clear blue colour of the Speedwell blossom up- 

 turned to the sky, and, as it were, reflecting the azure 

 vault, called the little flower the true image, the Veronica. 



Coming back for a moment from the romance of science 

 to its facts, In what part of the world did Veronicas 

 originate ? Such a question may arise in the mind when 

 \\c consider what is the present distribution of the plants 

 of this genus. But we cannot answer it. They occur in 

 the North Temperate Zone always as small herbs with 

 usually alternate leaves and blue or bluish flowers ; they 

 are apparently found nowhere within the tropics, but they 

 reappear in South America, in Australia, but especially 

 in New Zealand, where they constitute one of the most 

 characteristic plant groups we have. But in these islands 

 they occur most commonly as shrubs, and have opposite 

 usually uncut leaves, and floWers which are white, pink, or 

 lilac, but rarely blue in colour. There are a few exceptions 

 to the preceding general character, and one species occa- 

 sionally found in the North Island is the same as a common 

 European plant. 



The genus must have been widely spread at one time, 

 perhaps over a submerged Antarctic continent, and it must 

 be an ancient genus, for the species present a most remark- 

 able diversity of structure. One of them, Veronica elliptica, 

 which is a very common and familiar shrub along the sea- 



