Linnean System of Plants. 137 
yet all are octandrous, and all monogynous. Of this first 
order we have nine British genera, of which eight are well 
known, and the greater number handsome. Of the Gnothéra 
we have but one species i, biénnis (7s, twice, annus, a year), 
the evening primrose ; and some botanists doubt whether that 
is really a native. Sir J. E. Smith observes that, though 
undoubtedly wild on the coast of Lancashire, it may hae 
been brought by natural means from the other side of the 
Atlantic. It has been found in some places less suspicious, 
but still, it may be supposed to have escaped from gardens ; 
being a plant 1 in gener: Al cultivation. It has no resemblance 
to the primrose but in colour ; its fine fragrant petals expand 
in the evening, and make a conspicuous ‘figure in a bouquet, 
for which the flower is the better adapted as it is fragrant 
without being oppressive. Several foreign species are seen in 
gardens, some yet handsomer than es native or naturalised 
species. 
The willow-herb is a large and beautiful genus, of which 
we have nine native species: it derives its English name from 
the form of its leaves, and the watery situations in which it 
is found. The botanical appellation, Epildbium, signifies a 
violet on a pod*; but it must be acknowledged that the 
flower has very little resemblance to a violet, either in form 
or colour; neither is its pericarp properly termed a pod : — it 
is inferior, quadrangular, 1, 2, or 3 in. long, 
according to the species, and. more or less tinged 
with pedis it is composed of four pieces c palled 
valves which form the sides, and is divided into 
four cells by as many partitions extending from 
thence to the angles of the quadrangular re- 
ceptacle, as seen magnified i in jig. 26. a. (This 
receptacle is not to be considered as one of the 
seven parts of fructification ; it is the receptacle, 
not of the flower, but of the seeds.) If the 
seed-vessel be carefully opened on one side, 
when ripe, a sort. of silky feather will imme- 
diately spring out, as if weary of confinement 
in so narrow a lodging (4). Each seed is winged 
with these silken feathers (c), in which they lie 
embedded, until the valves make away for them 
to take flight, and by their means the plant is 
* Some persons believe the word violet to have reference to the colour 
only ; but one small objection to this interpretation is, that the colour is no 
more like that of the violet than the form: others suppose the word to be 
used in a complimentary sense, as we use the word pink. In France and 
Italy the name of violet is extended to many other flowers, more espe- 
cially the stocks, wallfowers, and others of the fifteenth class. 
