THE PRIMROSE FAMILY. 409 



are whorled at regular intervals, while the solitary flowers with darkly 

 streaked corollas are produced from their axils on thread-like pedicels, 



L. terrestris, bulb-bearing loosestrife, also a common plant, but one which 

 prefers to grow in moist meadows, or swamps, sends forth in a terminal 

 raceme a light, graceful spray of deep yellow flowers, their corolla being 

 marked with brownish red. The branching stem throws out many opposite 

 or very rarely alternate leaves which are flnely covered underneath with 

 dark spots. Sometimes this one of the loosestrifes slunvs the peculiarity 

 of bearing from the axils tiny elongated bulblets instead of flowers. Lin- 

 niiius even was deceived by them and mistook the plant when in this con- 

 dition for an erect and terrestrial mistletoe. 



L. Numniuldria, creeping loosestrife, moneywort, or creeping Jenny, we 

 often see in gardens or trailing over lawns. It is an exotic species, natural- 

 ised from Europe and distinctive from its opposite, rounded ovate, rather 

 small leaves and large solitary flowers growing from the axils. All its out- 

 lines are simple. 



Closely related to this genus is one called Steironema, the members of 

 which also mostly pass under the English name of " loosestrife." Among 

 them are such conspicuous members as : 



Steironema ciliatum, fringed loosestrife, found in low, moist ground. It 

 has large, lanceolate leaves with slender, ciliate petioles from whose axils 

 the yellow flowers grow on long, thread-like pedicels. Their five-parted 

 corollas have no tubes; but the five lobes are deeply parted and spreading, 

 the apices commonly mucronate and jagged. 



S. lanceoldium, lance-leaved loosestrife, may also be sought for in moist 

 soil and when found is known by its narrow, lanceolate leaves, considerably 

 smaller than those of the fringed loosestrife, and which are either petioled 

 or nearly sessile. Near their bases they are sparingly ciliate or naked along 

 the margins, and from the stem's axils thread-like pedicels ascend which 

 bear the yellow flowers. 



AMERICAN FEATHERFOIL. WATER=FEATHER. 



{Plate CXXXIV.) 

 Hottonia itiflata. 



F/<m>rrs : small, wliorlcd at the joints of clustered and inflated stems and sub- 

 tended bv bracts. Cutyx : five-parted. Corolla : salver-shai)ed ; tive-lohed, 

 shorter than the calyx. 'Stamens : five. Leaves : sessile, crowded about the base 

 of the flowering stems; divided into fine, thread-like, entire segments which ex- 

 tend to almost their middle. An aquatic herb, with submerged, spongy stem, 



