CLASS XVII. ORDER III. | ONONIS. 961 
are gathered and pickled for the same use as capers. The wood is 
hard, and is an excellent material for veneering. Broom is often 
cultivated in gardens as an ornamental shrub, but it is in its native 
wilds that it boasts of its chief beauty. Burns says— 
“ Their groves 0’ sweet myrtle let foreign lands reckon, 
Where bright beaming summers exalt the perfume ; 
Far dearer to me yon lone glen o’ green breckan, 
Wi’ the burn stealing under the lang yellow broom. 
Far dearer to me are yon humble broom bowers, 
Where the bluebell and gowan lurk lowly unseen ; 
For there, lightly tripping amang the sweet flowers, 
A listening the linnet oft wanders my Jean.” 
And Wordsworth, in allusion to the profusion of yellow flowers which 
it bears, says— 
“°?Twas that delightful season when the broom 
Full flowered and visible on every steep, 
Along the copses runs in yeins of gold.” 
GENUS VIL. ONO'’NIS.—Linn. Resé-harrow. 
Nat. Ord. Papiniona’cEaz. Linn. 
Gen. Cuar. Calyx cut into five linear teeth. Vewillum large, 
striated. Stamens monodelphous. Legumes turgid, sessile, 
few seeded.—Named ovos, an ass; because that animal delights 
to feed upon the plant. 
1. O.arven'sis, Linn. (Fig. 1113) Common Rest Harrow. Shrubby, 
hairy; stem ascending; branches at length spinous; flowers axil- 
lary, solitary, nearly sessile; leaves ovate oblong, toothed, the lower 
ones ternate, the upper simple; stipules toothed ; legumes obliquely 
ovate, erect, shorter than the hairy calyx; seeds two or three, rough. 
English Botany, t. 682, and Suppl. t. 2659.—English Flora, vol. 
iii. p. 266.—Hooker, British Flora, ed. 4. vol. i. p. 268.—Lindley, 
Synopsis, Suppl. p. 322.—O. antiquorum, Linn —O. spinosa, Linn. p. 
78.—O. procurrius, Wallroth, p. 78. 
foot long, tough wiry fibres. Stems annual, shrubby, of variable 
length, erect, reclining, or prostrate and rooting, round, branched, 
leafy, and mostly clothed with soft and more or less glandular 
pubescence, branches numerous, often terminating in a sharp rigid 
spine. eaves ovate oblong, finely toothed, but often towards the 
base entire, the lower ones mostly ternate, the upper simple, sessile, 
or on short footstalks, mostly downy, especially on the under side, the 
mid-rib prominent, and the lateral veins straight, parallel. Stipules — 
mostly large, united, clasping the stem, the margin finely toothed. 
Inflorescence solitary flowers in the axis of the upper leaves, more or 
