PTARMICA. 



PTARMICA. 



Involucre campanulate, with the scales brown and scarious at 

 the edge. Receptacle flat, or scarcely convex, broad, palea- 

 ceous. Ligulae 5-20, flat, expanded, much longer than the in- 

 volucre. Achaenia bald, obcompressed ; the outer often some- 

 what winged at the edge. DC. 



928. P. vulgaris Blackw. herb. t. 256. DC. prodr. vi. 23. 

 Achillea Ptarmica Linn, sp.pl 1266. Eng. Bot. t. 757. Fl. 

 Lond. t. 60. Smith Eng. Fl. iii. 460. Hedges and thickets 

 in moist places in Europe, Siberia, and North America. (Sneeze- 

 wort.) 



Root creeping widely, difficult of extirpation where the soil is moist. 

 Stems upright, about 2 feet high, angular, smooth, hollow, leafy, with 

 small axillary rudiments of branches ; corymbose at the top. Leaves 

 sessile, linear, or slightly lanceolate, acute, closely very minutely and 

 sharply serrated, with bristly teeth ; smooth on both sides, of a dark 

 somewhat glaucous green. Flower-heads milk-white in the disk as 

 well as the radius, larger than in most of the genus, and with a greater 

 number of ligulate florets. A double variety, whose disk consists en- 

 tirely of such, is frequent in country gardens. Involucre rather hemi- 

 spherical. Achaenia compressed, dilated at the edges, but not crowned 

 at the top. The whole plant is pungent, provoking a flow of saliva. 

 Its dried leaves produce sneezing, but this is thought to be owing to 

 their little sharp marginal teeth. Smith. 



SANTOLINA. 



Heads many-flowered ; either homogamous or heterogamous. 

 Florets of the ray few, somewhat ligulate, by abortion ? . Re- 

 ceptacle convex, somewhat hemispherical, covered with oblong 

 somewhat embracing paleae. Involucre usually campanulate, 

 with imbricated close-pressed scales. Tube of the corolla usu- 

 ally extended into a ring or hood surrounding the apex of the 

 ovary. Achaenium oblong, quadrangular, quite smooth, and bald. 

 DC. 



929. S. fragrantissima Forsk. descr. 14-7. Vahl. symb. i. 70. 

 Del.fl. cegypt. 119. t. 42. f. 3. Egypt, Palestine, and between 

 Bagdad and Aleppo. 



A small spreading shrub about a foot high, with the habit of Ruta 

 fruticulosa; the branches tomentose and corymbose at the ends. 

 Leaves ovate or oblong, with callous serratures, sessile, somewhat 

 cordate, dotted; the young ones shaggy. Corymbs many-headed. 

 Involucre ovate, downy, white. Florets yellow. Paleae tomentose at 

 the apex. Tube of the corolla slender, not drawn down over the neck 

 of the ovary. The flower-heads are extremely fragrant when dry, and 

 are sold in the shops of Cairo as a substitute for Chamomile, under the 

 name of Babouny or Zeysoum. Forskahl says the fresh juice of the 

 plant is applied in affections of the eyes (oculis dolentibus). 

 461 



