FAMILY HERBAL, 291 



common in boggy places on our heaths. It grows 

 six or seven inches high. The leaves all rise im- 

 mediately from the root : they are roundish and 

 hollow, of the breadth of a silver twopence,, and 

 placed on foot-stalks of an inch long ; they are 

 covered in a very extraordinary manner with long 

 red hairs, and in the midst of the hottest days they 

 have a drop of clear liquour standing on them. 

 The stalks are slender and naked : at their tops 

 stand little white flowers, which are succeeded 

 by seed-vessels, of an oblong form, contain- 

 ing a multitude of small seeds. The root is fi- 

 brous. 



The whole plant is used fresh gathered. It is 

 esteemed a great cordial^ and good against convul- 

 sions; hysteric disorders, and tremblings of the limbs ; 

 but it is not much regarded. 



Rhubarb ffliabarbarum. 



A tall, robust, and not unhandsome plant, a 

 native of many parts of the East, and of late got 

 into our gardens, after we had received many others 

 falsely called by its name. 



It grows to three feet in height. The stalk is 

 round, thick, striated, and of a greenish colour, 

 frequently stained with purple. The leaves are 

 very large, and of a figure approaching to triangu- 

 lar : they are broad at the base, small at the point, 

 and waved all along the edges. These stand on 

 thick hollowed foot-stalks, which are frequently 

 also reddish. The flowers are whitish, small and 

 inconsiderable : they stand at the tops of the stalks 

 in the manner of dock-flowers, and make little more 

 figure ; the seed is triangulated. The root is thick, 

 long, and often divided toward the bottom ; of a 

 yellow colour veined with purple, but the purple 



