TUBEROVS MOSCHATEL. 5o 



and analysis than is here desirable ; but those who care to 

 pursue the subject at greater length will find in such 

 " Floras " as those of Dr. Hooker or of Bentham all the 

 information they could desire. John Ray, in his early 

 system of plant classification, placed the moschatel amongst 

 his Het'ltfe bacciferee, or berry-bearing plants ; but such 

 broad massing of plants has little scientific value, and is 

 only a degree better than placing it amongst root-pos- 

 sessing plants. Another practical disadvantage, from the 

 English point of view, is that in these islands the plant 

 rarely produces its berries at all. 



The early writers found considerable difficulty in 

 assigning its botanical position to the moschatel. One old 

 author, we see, calls it the musk-ranunculus, whilst another 

 places it amongst the fumitories in either case the form of 

 the leaves being probably the cause of the arrangement. If 

 our readers, after studying our present plate, will turn to 

 the various species of buttercup, and to the common fumi- 

 tory that we have already figured, they will see that there 

 is a certain similarity in this respect. 



The root-stock of the moschatel is covered with thick 

 fieshy scales, and from this the flower-stem rises to a height 

 of some six inches. The flowers are pale green in colour, 

 and form a little cluster at the summit of the stem. The 

 terminal flower has often four divisions in the corolla, while 

 the lateral blossoms frequently have five ; but this is by no 

 means a constant arrangement. The stamens vary in the 

 same way from eight to ten. The radical leaves, as may be 

 very clearly seen in our figure, are borne on long stalks, 

 and are deeply cut into numerous segments, while the 

 flower-stems each bear a single pair ; these are on shorter 

 stems, and less elaborately divided. The cluster of berries 



