356 PETROSEIINUM. t^LASS v. ORDER n 



obsolete. Petals entire, roundish, with a small abruptly inflexed point, 

 and a greenish mid-rib. Stamens about as long as the petals, with 

 wcuvvedi filaments, and bearing roundish anthers of two cells. Fruit 

 rather small, roundish, oblong, quite smooth. Carpels closely united, 

 the thread-like ridges equal, the two lateral ones forming the margins, 

 the channels have one, or the outer ones have three vittce. Albumen 

 very convex, almost gibbous at the back, plain in front. 



Habitat. — Moist marshy places, and on the banks of rivers, espe- 

 cially near the sea ; not unfrequeut, in England ; Musselburgh, in 

 Scotland. Plentiful near Irishtown and Baldoyle, and various places 

 on the Dublin coast, Ireland. 



Biennial ; flowering in August. 



This, the well known culinary plant of our gardens, appears to have 

 been grown for domestic use in the time of Pliny, and probably before. 

 It is one of the many remarkable instances we have of the conquest of 

 cultivation, and the power which it possesses in changing that which is 

 dangerous into a bland and grateful vegetable, subservient to our use ; 

 for Celery, in its wild state, is very acrid, with a strong disagreeable 

 smell, and is said to be poisonous ; but when it is cultivated it looses 

 all its noxious properties, and becomes one of our most mild and 

 pleasant garden vegetables : and to see, as sometimes is the case, a 

 single plant with the footstalks of the leaves three feet long, blanched 

 a beautiful white, with a mild agreeable flavour, and the plaut weigh- 

 ing six pounds, it scarcely appears credible that it should have been 

 produced from a noxious weed, which, when the stem is full grown, 

 rarely exceeds two feet high, and does not weigh more than an ounce 

 or two. 



GENUS LI. PETROSELl'NUM.— HoFFM. Parsletj. 



Gen. Char. Calyx limb obsolete. Petals roandish, entire, slightly 

 emarginate, with a narrow incurved point. Fruit ovate, laterally, 

 contracted, nearly double. Carpels with five filiform equal ridges, 

 the two lateral ones forming the margin. Channels with single 

 vittce. Albumen very con\ex at the back, plain in front. General 

 involucre of few, partial of many, segments.— Name from -ttit^o;, 

 a stone ; from the circumstance of the plants of this genus grow- 

 ing in rocky or stony places. 

 1. P. sativum, Hnff. (Fig. 420.) common Parsley. Stem erect, 

 striated ; leaves doubly compound, shining; leaflets of the lower leaves 

 ovale, wedge-shaped, three-cleft, and toothed ; upper leaflets lanceo- 

 late, entire, three-cleft; partial involucre of awl-shaped segments. 



