29 



N. Ord. POLYGALACE^. Lindl., Veg. K., p. 375 ; Le Maout & Dec., 



p. 249; Baill., Hist. PL, vol. v. 



Genus Polygala,* Linn. B. & H., Gen., i, p. 136; Baill., 1. c., 

 p. 87. Species about 200 or more, natives of all parts of the 

 world in temperate and warm countries. 



29. Polygala Senega, f Linn., Sp. Plant., ed. I, p. 704 (1753). 

 Rattlesnake-root. Seneca Snake-root. 



Figures. Woodville, t. 162?; Barton, ii, t. 36, cop. in Steph. & Ch., 

 t. 103; Bigelow, t. 30; Nees, t. 412; Hayne, xiii, t. 21 ; Berg & Sch., 

 t. 10 a; Bot. Mag., 1. 1051; Gray, 111. Gen. U. S., t. 183. 



Description. A perennial herb, with numerous slender, wiry, 

 erect, smooth, simple stems, 6 12 inches nigh, coming off from 

 the somewhat dilated knotty crown of a thick, hard, contorted, 

 slightly branched, irregular root. Leaves very small at the base 

 of the stems, becoming larger upwards, alternate, sessile, exsti- 

 pulate, narrowly lanceolate, acute at both ends, smooth, the 

 margins rather rough, pale below. Flowers small, numerous, 

 shortly stalked, crowded in a narrow terminal spike \ 2 inches 

 long. Sepals 5, persistent, of which the upper one and two lower 

 are small, green, lanceolate, and acute, and the two lateral (inner) 

 ones (wings) large, petaloid, slightly veined, orbicular and 

 concave, enclosing the petals. Petals 3, hypogynous, united 

 below, the two lateral oblong, blunt, veiny, the lower one cup- 

 shaped, and provided at the end on the exterior with a tuft of 

 filiform processes (crest). Stamens 8, lying in the lower petal, 

 united into two bundles of 4 (diadelphous), the bundles fused 

 below with the petals, free above ; anthers very small, 1 -celled, 

 opening by a pore at the apex. Ovary laterally compressed, 2- 

 celled by a transverse partition, with one pendulous ovule in either 

 cell; style large, curved upwards into a thick blunt beak. Fruit 



* Polygala, from TroXvf , much, and yaXa, milk ; from the supposed effects. 

 f Senega, from the Seneca tribe of North American Indians, among whom 

 the plant was used as a remedy for snake-bites. 



