THE FOXGLOVE TRIBE. 195 



larity of the corolla and stamens, they exactly agrc(i 

 with the last, only it is carried much farther in the 

 Foxglove tribe than in the Mint tribe : for the pe- 

 tals are sometimes so irregularly combined, that one 

 can scarcely make out their real number and nature 

 by any of the ordinary tests ; as in the charming 

 genus Calceolaria, the lower lip of whose corolla is 

 inflated like the foot of a clumsy slipper, and in the 

 still more remarkable Chilian Schizanthus, whose 

 corolla is cut and slashed as if it had been clipped 

 with a pair of shears. 



No better example of this order can be selected 

 than the common Foxglove (Digitalis), which is so 

 striking an ornament of many parts of England. Its 

 corolla (Jig. 1.) is a large inflated body, with its throat 

 spotted with rich purple, and it border divided ob- 

 liquely into five very short lobes, of which the two 

 upper are the smaller ; its four stamens are of un- 

 equal length (Jig. 2.) ; and its style is divided into 

 two lobes (Jig. 6.) at the upper end. A number of 

 long glandular hairs cover the ovary (Jig. 5.), which 

 contains two cells, and a great quantity of ovules. 



This will show you what the usual character is of 

 the Foxglove tribe ; and you will find that all the 

 other genera referred to it in books agree with it 

 essentially, although they diffbr in subordinate points. 

 It is chiefly in the form of the corolla, in the number 

 of the stamens, in the consistence of the rind of the 

 fruit, its form, and the number of seeds it contains, 

 and in the manner in which the sepals are combined, 

 that these differences consist. 



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