ILLUSTRATIONS. 7 



form deep purple, has been lately found at Pinner, and also 

 at Chislehurst. 



Growing in wet open places, and amongst the earliest of wild 

 flowers, is another Ranunculaceous plant, petal-less like the 

 foregoing, namely, the Marsh Marigold,^ a specious-looking 

 stout-growing perennial, with bold roundish leaves, hollowed 

 at the base in what is called a heart-shaped form, and whose 

 bright golden flowers have much the structure of those of the 

 Wood Anemone, but are larger and more conspicuous from 

 being elevated on a tall branching stem. They have a varying 

 number of about five or six coloured sepals and no real petals, 

 a tuft of numerous stamens, and a variable number of car- 

 pels or fruits, each one containing several seeds. Somewhat 

 resembling this, and one of the same group, but dwarfer, and 

 having both calyx and corolla present, so as to form a com- 

 plete regular polypetalous or many-petaled flower, which for 

 the purpose of comparison it may be useful to examine in 

 connection with the Marsh Marigold, is the Lesser Celandine 

 (Ranunculus Ficaria) ,ionndi abundantly in moist waste places, 

 and easily recognized by its glossy-looking yellow star-like 

 flowers, and its white-mottled angular-lobed leaves. 



The Ladies'-smock,t during the months of early spring, 

 imparts its own blush to the surface of moist low-lying 

 meadow land, among the herbage of which it grows up. This 

 plant, also a Polypetalous Exogeu, sometimes called Bitter- 

 cress and Cuckoo-flower, is a dwarf herb, growing erect to 

 about a foot in height, and having pinnate leaves ; the flowers 

 are large and showy, and will serve to illustrate the structure 

 of a considerable polypetalous regular-flowered group or Order, 

 known as Cruciferous plants, or Cross-bearers, from the cir- 



* Caltha palustris — Plate 1 B. 



t Cardamine pratensis— 'Plate 1 C. 



