SORREL. 301 



■pathum;) Curled Dock (It. crispus ;) and broad-leaved Dock 

 (i?. obtusifolius) are particularly abundant. The Sheep's-sorrel 

 (R. acetosella) bears some resemblance to the common Sorrel, 

 but is easily recognised by its hastate lower leaves with entire 

 lobes, ovate enlarged petals destitute of tubercles, and its 

 smaller size, varying from three to ten inches in height. 



General Uses.— Sorrel is much employed, especially on the continent, 

 for culinary purposes, but the French Sorrel (R. scutatus) is more com- 

 monly cultivated and is more highly esteemed. The leaves are used in 

 salads, and as an ingredient in broths and soups, and they form an excel- 

 lent sauce for stewed lamb or veal. In some parts of Ireland they are eaten 

 with fish and other alkalescent food. Linnaeus mentions that Sorrel and 

 Angelica are the only plants used by the Laplanders as food, except berries. 

 " They prepare with Sorrel a kind of acetated whey, which they call juemo- 

 melke, in the following manner : They fill a copper vessel with the leaves and 

 pour over them a third part of water, which they boil to the consistence of a 

 syrup ; then adding a fresh quantity of leaves, they boil again, constantly 

 stirring with a piece of wood, lest the substance should acquire a burnt 

 taste ; when the boiling, which generally occupies six or seven hours, is 

 finished, they set aside the mass that it may cool ; it is then mixed with 

 rein-deer milk, and preserved in wooden vessels, or in those made with the 

 stomach (ventriculo primo) of the rein-deer. This whey retains its grateful 

 acid flavour for a long time, and is much relished both by young and old." * 

 Linnaeus observes, that he knows of no other people who use this article 

 of diet, and that the Laplanders themselves do not take it as a remedy for 

 scurvy, since they are as little troubled with that disease as they are with 

 the sun's heat in the midst of winter. The seeds of sorrel have been some- 

 times mixed with corn and made into bread. Dr. Clarke -f- states that the 

 inhabitants of Wermeland, on the confines of Sweden, make a kind of 

 bread with the seeds alone in times of scarcity. The roots may be employed 

 in tanning : when dried and boiled in water they afford, with the addition 

 of alum, a fine red colour useful to painters. The foliage of this plant, as 

 of most others of the genus, is eaten by domestic cattle. 



Qualities.— The root has a reddish-brown or yellowish colour, a bitterish 

 sub-astringent taste, and is destitute of odour. The red colour of the aqueous 

 infusion of the roots is changed by alkalies to a purplish, and by sulphate 

 of iron to a deep green colour. The fresh leaves are very acid, with a 

 slight roughness and astringency ; the expressed juice obtained from them 

 is green, thick, and turbid, but when the faeces have subsided it is clear 

 and of a reddish colour, and more gratefully acid than the leaves in sub- 

 stance, when inspissated affording an essential salt, which is said to be 



* Flora Lapponica ed. J. E. Smith, p. 100. 



f Travels, &c, part iii. p. 90, 4to, Lond. 1823. 



