62 RHEXIA VIRGINICA. MEADOW-BEAUTY. 



We may perhaps be able to find some clue to the derivation 

 of the name, by going back to antiquity. Pliny mentions a 

 plant called R/icxia, and says that its name is simply a synonym 

 for OuocJiilus, literally " the ass's lip.'' But this last is now 

 identified with the " Alkanah," or Anclmsa tinctorial the roots 

 of which are used as a vulnerary, and which, according to Lin- 

 naeus, is liable to be confounded in pharmacy with the " Red 

 Root," Onosma echoides, of Greece; Oiiosma literally meaning 

 " that which asses are fond of," or " the asses' plant." Now, 

 as Rhexia has a root which is very like the "Red Root" of 

 the ancients, it is barely possible that the employment of the 

 Plinian name was suggested by this similarity. We must con- 

 fess, however, that, although we have thus succeeded in carrying 

 the name back eighteen hundred years, we have done nothing- 

 whatever to explain its meaning. We may therefore well say 

 with Dr. Gray, that Rhexia has been "applied to this genus 

 without obvious reason." 



It is a curious fact that the root of this plant seems to be 

 almost unknown to botanists. Barton says positively it is 

 fibrous, while Fig. i on our plate shows it to be in reality tuber- 

 ous. This fact has, however, been commented on by others 

 before us, as shown by a communication in the " American 

 Naturalist" for 1873, in which a botanical correspondent 

 writes : " This species produces fusiform tubers, and of course 

 grows from them the following year. But Gray's 'Manual,' 

 Chapman's ' Flora,' and Bentham and Hooker's ' Genera Plan- 

 tarum ' make no mention of it, and hence I infer it is not 

 generally known." We are as yet unable positively to describe 

 the way in which these tubers are formed. Most tubers are 

 formed in a horizontal direction, but in some plants, as for 

 instance in the Dioscorea Batatas, the Chinese yam, a descend- 

 ing root thickens, and forms a tuber, and this appeared to be the 

 case in the specimen of Rhexia r/r^'/V/^Wz; which was procured 

 for our artist. It may, however, have been accidental. 



Lesquereux says our plant is very abundant in moist places 



