30 f AMI LI All WILD LOWERS. 



from seed, for we have seen the plants spring up year after 

 year on the same piece of bank as regularly as though they 

 were as perennial as oak-trees, or any other such symbols 

 of endurance. 



The Buxbaum's speedwell branches freely and attains to 

 a height of a foot or so ; its stems and leaves are thickly 

 clothed with soft and silky hairs. The leaves are placed 

 singly at irregular intervals along the stem, but are more 

 numerous as we approach its summit. They are broadly 

 heart-shaped, having their margins deeply cut into teeth, 

 and each leaf has its short leaf-stalk, or in more technical 

 language we may add that they are petiolate, cordate- 

 ovate, inciso-serrate. All the leaves on the plant are of 

 the same character. The flower-bearing stems that spring 

 from the axils of the leaves are very long, and give a 

 decided character to the plant, while the flowers them- 

 selves have the curious Veronica character three large 

 and fairly equal segments and then a lower and narrower 

 one. The blossoms are a bright clear blue in colour, and 

 for a Veronica are decidedly large. The fruit or capsule 

 that succeeds the flower is twice as broad as it is long, and 

 this flattened-out character is a very marked specific feature. 

 It may be seen most clearly as the capsules ripen and 

 develop, and is therefore best exhibited in our drawing in 

 the detached piece at the bottom. The fruit, it will readily 

 be observed, is two-lobed. 



This graceful and beautiful flower derives its somewhat 

 uncouth name from a distinguished botanist of the last cen- 

 tury. Such complimentary names have often been applied 

 by men of science in each other's honour, thus we get the 

 Bartsia, so called by Linnaeus in honour of his friend, John 

 Bartseh a distinguished German botanist ; the Schenchzeria, 



