154 JUNE 



with pink buds and exquisitely fringed blossoms of 

 pearly white, growing in company with sapphire 

 brooklime and turquoise forget-me-not. The buck- 

 bean belongs to the Gentian family, and possesses 

 the bitter properties of its relatives. In Scotland, 

 especially in Eenfrewshire, country people prepare 

 a tisane from its leaves, supposed to be a remedy for 

 rheumatism, but they disguise the bitter flavour with 

 such quantities of sugar as to endanger, one would 

 think, its tonic virtue. The most fragrant riverside 

 flower now coming into bloom is the meadow-sweet. 

 There is a seeming ambiguity in the scientific name 

 of this plant, Spircea, for there is nothing spiral in 

 the habit of this or any other member of the large 

 and charming group to which it belongs. It is not 

 till the lens reveals the spiral or twisted arrange- 

 ment of the seed-capsules that one realises why 

 Linnaeus chose to distinguish this genus from the 

 rest of the rose family by the title Spiraea the 

 twisted one. 



Kiver shallows which, but a few weeks ago, were 

 ridged with rime and solid ice, are now white with 

 the mimic snow of water ranunculus. The blaze of 

 golden kingcups has yielded place to the lighter 

 fretwork of buttercups, and ragged-robin flings a 



