94 FLORA DOMESTIC A. 



very dry weather : the last-mentioned species loves the 

 shade. 



Clorin, who was learned in the properties of plants, speaks 

 of the Celandine as a purifier of the blood : 



" Yellow Lysimachus, to give sweet rest 

 To the faint shepherd, killing, where it comes, 

 All busy gnats, and every fly that hums : 

 For leprosy, darnell, and celandine, 

 With calamint, whose virtues do refine 

 The blood of man, making it free and fair 

 As the first hour it breathed, on the best air." 



FAITHFUL SHEPHERDESS. 



Of the Lysimachus here mentioned, which in English is 

 called Loose Strife, there is a story that it was so named 

 because the Romans had a notion that the flowers, put under 

 the yokes of oxen, kept them from quarrelling with each 

 other. If Glorias account of its virtues be correct, the 

 Romans may have had good reason for this notion, since 

 the plant, by killing or keeping off flies and other stinging 

 insects, must have relieved them from a great source of 

 irritation. 



The Small Celandine, or Pilewort, is not usually ad- 

 mitted into gardens ; but, on the contrary, on account of 

 the injury it does to every thing growing near it, is care- 

 fully rooted out wherever it appears. It is a species of 

 ranunculus, called the Ranunculus jicaria, from the shape 

 of the root, which resembles that of the fig ; and belongs 

 to the natural family of the Ranunculacete. 



In early spring, there is scarcely a grove, thicket, mea- 

 dow, hedge, orchard, or plantation of any kind, that is not 

 covered with the glossy golden flowers of the Small Celan- 

 dine. When they have been exposed for some days to 

 the heat of the sun, they turn white, and fall off: they are 

 succeeded by small bulbs, like grains of wheat, which 

 shoot from the bosom of the leaves ; and as the stalks He 



