WOOD-SORREL FAMILY. 



The Woodland's Sorrel's petals pale, 

 Vein'd with fine purple streaks we found, 

 Hid in the thicket's mantled ground, 

 And pluck' d admiring. BP. MANT. 



The XXII Order contains but the two WOOD- 

 SOKRELS, (Oxalis) one of which is so plentiful, (and 

 so. beautiful) in many a wood, and shady hedge, that 

 you may probably be well acquainted with it already. 

 But perhaps, the Botanist can bring to view, some 

 curious and interesting peculiarities, we, as yet, know 

 nothing of. Its seed-vessel, like the Balsam, has an 

 " elastic, fleshy outer integument, which, on bursting 

 open, projects the seed to a distance." If you but 

 press the seed-vessel with your finger and thumb, it 

 will send its seeds into your face with sufficient force 

 to hurt an eye ; but who will not like to try the ex- 

 periment ? This most delicately beautiful of all our 

 wood flowers (only less conspicuous in size than the 

 Anemone) generally covers a large space, wherever 

 it has once taken root; and this property in the 



