304 FEVERFEW. 



firm, smooth, striated, branched, and usually about two feet in 

 height. The leaves are alternate, petiolate, of a light ash- 

 coloured green, pinnated ; the pinnules more or less ovate, 

 decurrent, pinnatifid, with incised, somewhat obtuse lobes. 

 The flowers are large, pedunculate, and disposed in a corym- 

 bose manner at the extremity of the stem and branches. The 

 involucre is hemispherical, imbricated with scales which are 

 membranous, and somewhat villous at the margin. The florets 

 of the disk are numerous, perfect, tubular, and five-toothed, 

 yellow ; those of the ray pistilliferous, short, oblong, nearly 

 round, with three small terminal teeth, white. The filaments 

 five, very short; anthers forming a hollow cylinder. The 

 germen angular, abrupt, with a short filiform style, and a bifid, 

 obtuse, spreading stigma. The receptacle is naked, slightly 

 conical, brownish black, dotted. The fruit is oblong, truncate 

 at the base, smooth, furrowed, whitish, destitute of pappus, 

 crowned with a shallow, slightly toothed, membranous border. 

 Plate 20, fig. 3, (a) the root ; (6) floret of the disk magnified ; 

 (c) floret of the ray ; (</) scale ; (e) vertical section of the 

 flowering axis ; (/) seed magnified. 



This plant is found wild in stony and uncultivated places, 

 and about hedges. Deserted gardens into which it has once 

 been admitted are soon overrun with it. It flowers in July. 



Feverfew is supposed to be the Ttap^zviov of Dioscorides, so 

 called from its use in disorders of the uterus, and of which 

 Matricaria, is a kind of Latin version. Pyrethrum is derived 

 from TTLij, fire, in allusion to its acrid roots. 



A variety with double flowers is cultivated in gardens for its 

 ornamental character. In this state, the florets of the disk are 

 so metamorphosed as to resemble those of the ray. The other 

 British species are the Corn Feverfew, (^Pyrethrum inodoruniy) 

 common in fields, with sessile, bipinnatifid leaves, having capil- 

 lary segments; flowers with a large ray, and a very convex disk, 

 and its fruit with an entire border. The Sea Feverfew (Pyre- 

 thrum maritimum) very much resembles the last, except that 

 the flowers are smaller and the border of the fruit is lobed. 



Qualities. — The odour of Feverfew is peculiar, strong, and 

 pungent, resembling chamomile and tansy, but more developed, 

 and is partly lost in drying. It is bitter, hot, and nauseous to 

 the taste. It contains a small quantity of resin combined 



