2 FAMILIAR WILD FLOWERS. 



genus, the C. glomerate, or clustered bell-flower, a plant 

 no less beautiful than any of the others, as all will admit 

 who have seen its purple spires amidst the vegetation of 

 the hedgerow. It delights in dry upland country, and 

 seems to have a special liking for the chalk, though we 

 find it scattered over the greater part of England. In 

 Ireland it would appear to be unknown, and in Scotland 

 we only find it in the southern counties. Few plants 

 probably vary more in appearance according to the locality 

 in which they are found. When we see it on the face of 

 the open down, it is often dwarfed to a mere three or four 

 inches in height, and the flowers no less than the rest 

 of the plant share in the general diminution of the parts ; 

 but when we find it in a more sheltered position, as in a 

 hedgerow, the plant is often a foot or more in height, and 

 crowded with blossoms. As these blossoms cluster at the 

 tops of the stems, the plant is rendered additionally con- 

 spicuous, as the mass of purple colour comes prominently 

 forward, and attracts the eye amidst the surrounding ver- 

 dure. This clustering head of blossoms has given the 

 plant its popular English name, and also its specific name, 

 glomerata, a Latin word, signifying formed into a mass 

 like a ball. The flowers are stalkless, and spring in small 

 bunches from the axils of the upper leaves ; but the ter- 

 minal bunch is always considerably the largest, and is 

 in many cases the only one, and in imperfectly developed 

 specimens, or plants that have had to suffer from un- 

 towardly hard conditions of existence, is often represented 

 by only some two or three blossoms. We mention this 

 more particularly, and repeat it, because there is no plant 

 that varies more, and our readers might fail to realise that 

 a puny little plant, say three inches high, and showino- a 



