6 FAMILIAR WILD FLOWERS. 



farmer to eradicate it as far as may be. Though it bears 

 a strong similarity to the bulbous crowfoot, a plant we have 

 already figured, a little discrimination will soon enable 

 us to distinguish the two species. 



The upright meadow crowfoot worthily deserves its 

 name, as it is one of the tallest of our buttercups, and 

 there is a peculiar lightness and delicacy in its freely 

 up-springing stems. The plant may often be found a 

 yard or more high, and its appearance is distinctly 

 " genteel," to quote Martyn, the author of the "Flora 

 Rustica." The meadow-crowfoot has perennial roots, 

 consisting of numerous white fibres. The stems are 

 hollow, often more or less covered with soft silky hairs, 

 and very freely branching towards their summits. The 

 leaves vary a good deal in form, according to their position 

 on the plant, a feature that may be very clearly seen in 

 our illustration. The lower leaves are on long footstalks, 

 composed of numerous widely-spreading and deeply-divided 

 segments, while the upper leaves are small, composed of few 

 segments, simple in form, and few in number. The flowers 

 form a golden crown to the plant, being very numerous, 

 and growing at the extremities of the stems. These 

 flower-bearing stems are not channelled or furrowed as in 

 many of the other species, but are smooth and cylindrical. 

 The calyx is composed of fine greenish yellow and spreading 

 sepals, while the corolla has the same number of bright 

 golden yellow and glistening petals ; in its centre is the 

 clustering mass of stamens. The fruit consists of numerous 

 small bodies, technically called achenes, clustered together 

 into a globular head ; an example of the form may be seen 

 in the centre of our illusti-ation. 



The plant is one of the flowers of the early summer, 



