CHAMOMILE. 157 



pinnae linear, somewhat hairy, pale green, and generally divided 

 into three acute segments. The flowers stand singly on long 

 striated, hairy peduncles terminating the branches ; the disk is 

 yellow, at length conical, and the ray white. The involucre is 

 hemispherical, and composed of several small imbricated nearly 

 equal scales, with membranous margins. The florets of the 

 disk are numerous, hermaphrodite, tubular, and five-toothed; 

 those of the ray or circumference, generally about eighteen in 

 number, are long, spreading, ligulate, and three-toothed at the 

 extremity^ the tube enclosing a pistil only ; the receptacle con- 

 vex, honey-combed, and beset with chaffy scales. The five 

 filaments are capillary, very short, and have their anthers united 

 into a cylindrical tube. The germen is obovate, terminated by 

 a filiform style, and a bifid spreading stigma. The fruit is 

 obovate, crowned with a membranous border or pappus. The 

 seed is solitary and erect. Plate 14, fig. 1, (a) involucre cut 

 through, showing the receptacle, on the summit of which is left 

 a floret accompanied by its scale; (b) floret of the disk; (c) 

 floret of the ray. 



This useful plant is widely dispersed over the globe, both in 

 warm and temperate climates. It flourishes in dry gravelly 

 pastures and waste places in various parts of England, and in 

 the isles of Cumrae and Bute, Scotland, flowering from the 

 end of July to September. 



The generic name is derived from a-.r.-:, a Jloncr, on account 

 of the profusion of its blossoms. The common English name of 

 the plant is a corruption of Chanicemelum, formed from yjvj^xi, 

 on the ground, and ai^Ajv, an apple, because the plant smells like 

 apples, or rather quinces*. The Spaniards call it manzaniUa, or 

 little apple. A double variety of this plant is often cultivated in 

 gardens and sold instead of the single, but is much less eflS- 

 cacious as a medicine. The principal virtues of chamomile are 

 supposed to reside in the involucre, and the unnatural develop- 

 ment occasioned by the production of double flowers seems to 

 divest it in great measure of the qualities for which it is so much 

 valued t. 



• Plin. Hist. Nat. Kb. xxii. c 21. 



■j- Much of -w-hat is brought to the London market is grown about 

 Mitcham, in Surrev. The soil best adapted for it is a dry sandy loam. 

 The flowers are collected before they are fully blown, and carefully dried. 



