150 MONADELPHIA PENTANDRIA. 



III. POLY AND RIA. 



211. MALVA. Styles numerous ; outer calyx of 3 leaves; capsules 

 whorled, single-seeded. 



I. PENTANtiRIA. 

 209. ERODIUM. 



1. E. aicutarium, stems procumbent, hairy ; stalks many-flower- 

 ed ; leaves pinnate, leaflets sessile, pinnatifid, cut ; stamens sim- 

 ple. Hemlock Stores-bill. 



Hdb. Dry sandy pastures and waste grounds, common. 

 On the Links from Spittal southward, the variety with 

 white flowers is the most common ; but remote from the 

 sea, the flowers are invariably rose-coloured. June 

 Aug. 



Among the numberless instances of obvious design in the 

 structure of the seeds and seed-vessels of plants, few are, 

 perhaps, more remarkable, or more strikingly display 

 themselves as the workmanship of an intelligent Artificer, 

 than that which we meet with in the seeds of E. cicuta- 

 rium. The seeds surround the pistil at its base; each 

 seed is covered with a coat peculiar to itself; which, af- 

 ter having inclosed the seed, runs out, in the form of a 

 narrow appendage, to the extremity of the style, to 

 which it is slightly connected along its whole length, and 

 which has five grooves to receive the five seeds with their 

 appendages. Each of these appendages has the property 

 of contracting itself into a spiral form when dry, and of 

 again extending itself into a right line when moist. In 

 short, it is a spiral spring, which lengthens or contracts 

 itself as it happens to become wet or dry. This power 

 first exerts itself when the seed and its appendage become 

 dry by maturity, when it gradually separates the seed 

 from its parent plant. The seed, thus disengaged, is con- 

 tinually contracting and dilating itself, as the weather 

 changes from wet to dry, and from dry to wet ; and by 

 this means is kept in motion, till it is either destroyed by 

 the vicissitudes of the seasons, or meets with some crevice 

 in the earth, or some light porous spot, into which it can 

 easily insinuate itself, and from thence, in due time, pro- 

 duce a new plant. See WITHERING, iii. 753. 



