148 



MUG WORT. 



lary racemose spikes ; each flower is ovate, sessile, and com- 

 posed of several small pale purplish florets seated on a naked 

 receptacle. The involucre consists of a few narrow, imbricated, 

 woolly scales. The florets of the circumference are female, 

 subulate, bifid at the limb, and about five in number ; those 

 of the centre, or disk, are hermaphrodite, with a filiform tube 

 and a five-cleft limb ; its segments acute and revolute. The 

 stamens are five ; the filaments setaceous, and the anthers 

 cylindrical, united into a tube. The germen is ovate, obtuse, 

 glabrous, surmounted with a setaceous style passing through 

 the tube of the anthers, (in the perfect florets,) tipped with a 

 bifid revolute stigma. The fruit is an obovate pericarp, or 

 achenium, destitute of pappus. Plate 33, fig. 4, (a) flower com- 

 posed of several small florets ; (b) female floret ; (c) hermaphro- 

 dite floret. 



This plant is common in Britain and in almost every climate, 

 in waste places, the borders of fields, and under hedges. It 

 flowers in July and August. 



The name Artemisia is said by Pliny to be derived from 

 Artemisia*, wife of Mausolus, King of Caria, who first dis- 

 covered the virtues of this plant, or from Artemis f, the Diana 

 of the Greeks. The common name, Mugwort, i. e. Mug- 

 plant, indicates its employment by way of infusion as a medi- 

 cinal drink. Parkinson thinks that it ought to be called Maiden- 

 wort ; and this would certainly be more in accordance with its 

 original designation, nafivnc,. In Germany, Holland, and some 

 other countries, it has received the name of St. John's plant J. 



* Who also erected, in memory of her husband, a magnificent tomb, 

 (mausoleum,) one of the seven wonders of the world, and for many cen- 

 turies the chief ornament of Halicarnassus. 



f " Quod privatim fceminarum malis, quibus a^ripis, i. e. Diana praeest, 

 medeatur." — Pliny. Or, as Macer has expressed it in tolerable verse, 

 " Hnjus opem fertur prios invenisse Diana, 

 Artemis a Graecis quae dicitur ; indeque nomen 

 Herba tenet, quia sic inventrix dicitur ejus. 

 Praecipue morbis muliebribus ilia medetur." 

 X Probably because it first comes into flower about St. John's day ; on 

 the eve of which day it is accustomed to be gathered with certain super- 

 stitious observances, and the possessor of it is thought to be secure from 

 apparitions, diseases, and misfortunes. The coals found at the root of 

 this plant on St. John's day, (cingulum Sancti Johannis,) either taken 

 internally or worn round the neck as an amulet, have been regarded by 



