POTENTILS 171 



anserine ailments, and that the name is a recog- 

 nition of this remedial service. It is a plant 

 equally at home in Lapland, the United States, 

 China, Chili, New Zealand, and, in fact, most 

 other places. 



In our miniature bog, the home of our water- 

 loving plants, we must not omit another British 

 species the P. Comarum, or marsh potentil. Its 

 flowers are of a dull purplish brown a feature 

 which gives the plant a curiously distinctive look, 

 and as it is some eighteen inches high it com- 

 mands attention. From some slight peculiarities 

 of botanical structure that we need not here par- 

 ticularise, it is sometimes placed in a closely allied 

 genus by itself and becomes the Comarum palustre. 

 Theophrastus many centuries ago named a plant 

 Comaros, but it is impossible to declare that that 

 plant was the marsh potentil in fact, we have 

 pretty conclusive evidence that it was not. 



The strawberry-leaved potentil the P. Fragarias- 

 trum is a very pretty little species, its leaflets in 

 threes, and its white five-petalled blossoms being 

 very reminiscent of the strawberry. The hoary 

 potentil too the P. argentea will claim a place 

 in our collection : it is a yellow-flowered species. 

 Nine of our British species have blossoms of this 

 colour, while three have them of a pure white. 1 



1 If instead of taking tin box and trowel and searching out 

 for ourselves Nature's wildlings, we put a few shillings in 



