THE CELANDINE. 



Chelidonium majus. Nat. Ord., Papa- 

 veracea. 



y__ E have already seen, in our com. 

 ments on the lady Vsmock, that 

 a considerable amount of am- 

 biguity and difficulty has arisen 

 from the fact that that and one 

 or two other plants flowering 

 at about the same time are all 

 called cuckoo flowers, and a, 

 very similar difficulty has arisen 

 in the present case. The word 

 celandine is derived from the 

 Greek word for a swallow, 

 because the flower is supposed 

 to come into blossom about 

 the same time that the swal- 

 lows return to us in each recurring 

 spring; and as several other plants 

 are then flowering as well as this, the 

 name has not been confined to the present 

 species. One of the earlier buttercups, a plant we have 

 already figured, though more correctly called the pile-wort 

 is almost as well-known by the name of celandine. The 

 pile-wort is ordinarily called the lesser celandine as a 



