65 WAYSIDE AND WOODLAND BLOSSOMS. 



plant, with erect branching stems. The true poppies have a 

 milky juice : this plant, like the Welsh-poppy (Meconopsis\ 

 and the Horned-poppy (Glaucium^ has a yellow juice. The 

 leaf is much divided, the leaflets deeply lobed, with somewhat 

 of a resemblance to an oak-leaf. The rather small yellow 

 flowers are combined in umbels, borne on a long stalk, to ' be 

 out of the way of the somewhat erect leaves. There are two 

 sepals and four petals, as in Papaver, but the fruit, instead of 

 being an urn-like capsule as in that genus, is a long pod with 

 two valves, which separate from the base upwards. 



It is a plant of the hedgerow and waste ground, where it may 

 be found in flower from May to August. The yellow juice, 

 which is very acrid and poisonous, had formerly a reputation 

 as an eye medicine, and as a caustic for the burning away of 

 warts. 



Ragged Robin (Lychnis flos-cuculi). 



Like the Celandines, this plant was known to our fathers as 

 a Cuckoo-flower ; in fact, in many parts of the country its name 

 is still " Cuckoo-flower," but as that title is also given to the 

 Ladies'-smock confusion is caused by its use. It is one of the 

 Campions, a genus of graceful plants that is included in the 

 Natural Order of the Pinks (Caryophylleae). 



The habit of the plant will suggest the Stitchwort, to which 

 it is not very distantly related. It is a perennial plant, 

 delighting in moist places, whether wet meadows, ditch banks 

 or bogs. The leaves that spring directly from the slender 

 rootstock are stalked ; those on the reddish stem are not. The 

 calyx is dark red, with purple veins ; the rosy petals cut into 

 four eccentric narrow segments. The flowers produce honey, 

 and the stamens come to maturity before the stigmas, thus 

 favouring cross-fertilization. Flowers May to August. 



There is another common rosy-flowered Lychnis that occurs 

 in somewhat similar situations. This is : 



