606 



SPA 



THE UNIVERSAL HERBAL; 



SPA 



the most exposed places, being extremely hardy, which ren- 

 ders them worthy of care, since they will succeed where few 

 other trees can liver If the fruit be sown in the common 

 ground, it will frequently be the second spring before it 

 makes its appearance, as in the Hawthorn. It should there- 

 fore be stripped of its pulp, and put in sand. 



3. Sorbus Domestica; True Service, or Sorb. Leaves 

 pinnate, villose underneath ; flowers in terminating panicles, 

 subcorymbed, tomentose; petals cream-coloured, concave, 

 with hairy claws; calix very woolly; fruit pear-shaped, red- 

 dish and spotted, extremely austere, and not eatable till it is 

 quite mellowed by frost or time, when it becomes brown and 

 very soft. In the middle are five cells, with one seed in each, 

 as in the Apple and Pear, with which this certainly agrees in 

 the fruit and number of styles ; but if general habit has any 

 weight in the arrangement of plants, this tree ought not to be 

 united to them. There are several varieties, which differ in 

 the number of their seeds ; some having three only, others 

 four or five. When it is said, therefore, that one character 

 of the genus is to have three seeds, it must be understood of 

 the wild tree; but in trees that are cultivated, the number of 

 seeds is as uncertain as in Apples and Pears. Great num- 

 bers of these trees grow wild about Aubigny in France ; this 

 species is indeed a native of the warm countries of Europe, 

 where it becomes a large and lofty tree, and the wood is used 

 by the turners, and for making mathematical instruments, 

 and excisemen's gauging-sticks. The fruit, which is like an 

 inferior Medlar, is there reputed good in the dysentery and 

 fluxes. Ray observed it growing in many mountainous parts 

 of Cornwall. It flowers in May. Those persons who raise 

 many of these trees from seeds, will obtain some varieties of 

 the fruit, from which the best may be selected, and propa- 

 gated for the tuble; and the others may be planted for variety 

 in wilderness or wood-walks, or may be used for stocks to 

 graft the better kinds upon. There is a variety with varie- 

 gated leaves, which is preserved by such as are curious in 

 collecting the several sorts of striped plants, but there is no 

 great beauty in it : it may be propagated by layers, or by 

 being budded on the plain sort, but they become plain on a 

 very rich soil. 



4. Sorbus Microcarpa. Leaves pinnate; little leaves acu- 

 minate, unequally inciso-serrate; serratures setaceous-nincro- 

 nate ; branches covered with a shining dark brown gloss ; 

 berries small, scarlet. A large shrub, growing on the peaks 

 of high mountains from New Jersey to Carolina. Pursh con- 

 siders this species very distinct from the first; though other 

 authors appear to have confounded them. 



Sorrel. See Rumex. 



Sorrel Tree. See Andromeda Arborea, and Ramcx. 



Sorrc!, Wood. See Oxalis. 



Sour Gourd. See Adansonia. 



Soursop. See Annona. 



Southernwood. See Artemisia. 



South Sea Tea. See Ilex. 



Sowbane. See Chenopodium Murale. 



Soy, Soya, or Soye. See Dolichos. 



Sowbread. See Cyclamen. 



Sowthistle. See Sonchus. 



Spanish Brown. See Spartium. 



Spanish Cress. See Vella. 



Spanish Elm. See Cordia Gerascanthus. 



Spanish Hcdye Nettle. See Prasium. 



Spanish Potatoes. See Convolvulus Batatas. 



Sparr/anium ; a genus of the class Monoecia, order Trian- 

 dria. GENF.IUC CHARACTER. Male flowers numerous, col- 

 lected into a head. Calix : ament common roundish, very 



closely imbricate on all sides, consisting of proper perianths, 

 that are three-leaved, linear, deciduous. Corolla : none. 

 Stamina : filamenta three, capillary, longer than the calix ; 

 antherse oblong. Females: below the males. Calix: as in 

 the male, according to Gartner, six-leaved; receptacle, com- 

 mon roundish. Corolla: none. Pistil: germen ovate, end- 

 ing in a short awl-shaped style ; stigma one or two acute, 

 channelled, permanent. Pericarp: drupe juiceless, turbinate, 

 with a point, angular below. Seed: nut bony, oblong-ovate, 

 angular. Observe. Tournefort remarked, that the seed in 

 some species is one-celled, in others two-celled ; though 

 neither Adanson nor Gartner could ever find two seeds or a 

 two-celled drupe. ESSENTIAL CHARACTER. Male and 

 Female. Ament: roundish. Calix: three-leaved. Corolla : 

 none. Female. Stigma : bifid. Drupe : juiceless, one- 

 seeded. The species are, 



1. Sparganium Ramosum ; Branched Bur-reed. Leaves 

 triangular at the base, their sides concave; common flower- 

 stalk branched; stigma linear. Root perennial, creeping; 

 stem upright, about three feet high, round, leafy, smooth; 

 heads of flowers alternate, sessile, many-flowered. The fruit 

 ripens into brown prickly heads of dry. deciduous drupes, by 

 which, as well as its spreading roots, the plant increases 

 abundantly. The parts of fructification vary much in num- 

 ber, as is usual in Monoecious and Direcious plants, and is 

 one of the many reasons for keeping them in distinct classes 

 from the hermaphrodite ones. It is common in ditches, and 

 along the banks of rivers, not only in Europe, but in Barbary, 

 Siberia, and North America, flowering in July and August. 

 Having a very strong creeping root, it soon fills up a ditch or 

 pond, if suffered to remain unmolested ; the smaller brooks 

 are soon clogged by it, and it forms dams with other aquatic 

 plants, which arrest the descending soil, and acumulate 

 islands or banks of earth. 



2. Sparganium Simplex; Unbranched Bur-reed. Leaves 

 triangular at the base, their sides flat; common flower-stalk 

 simple; stigma linear. This is seldom found more than one- 

 fourth of the height of the preceding species, but the flower 

 is larger in proportion : the flowers of the former look yellow 

 before they blow, and have none of that blackness about 

 them so conspicuous in the latter. It is found, in general, 

 upon particular spots, especially on heaths and commons in 

 pools of water made by digging gravel, throughout Europe, 

 as well as in North America; and flowers in July and 

 August. 



3. Sparganium Natans; Floating Bur-reed. Leaves droop- 

 ing, flat ; heads of flowers in a single spike, most of them 

 accompanied by leaves ; style not longer than the germen. 

 Root perennial, creeping, with long fibres, running deep into 

 the muddy bottoms of ditches or slow streams; stems ascend- 

 ing, round, leafy ; the fruit is a one-seeded drupe. When 

 the plant flowers, the flowering-stem is very slender, and does 

 not rise about six inches out of the water; it is simple, with 

 few balls of female flowers, not larger than a pea, while the 

 leaves float on the water to a considerable length. It prefers 

 a muddy or clayey soil, and occurs in Cambridgeshire, near 

 Lawston Moor; on Wilbraham Moor, and Burwell Fen; near 

 Norwich; in Yorkshire and Westmoreland; in Scotland, and 

 in Wales ; flowering in July. 



4. Sparganium Angustifolium ; Narrow-leaved Bur-reed. 

 Leaves flat, lax, larger than the stem; heads of male flowers 

 numerous; sliema oval; drupe obovate, even, depressed at 

 'the^summit. Found in New South Wales. 



Sparrmannia; a genus of the class Polyandria, order Mono- 

 gyriia. GENERIC CHARACTER. Calix: perianth four- 

 leaved; leaflets lanceolate, entire, reflex., villose. Corolla : 



