POLYGONACES. 55 
sagittate, with the basal lobes subparallel or slightly diverging or even 
converging ; lower stem leaves similar, but with shorter stalks; the upper 
ones narrower, sessile, amplexicaul. Ochrew at length laciniate, not 
silvery, brownish. Branches of the panicle rather few, ascending-erect, 
leafless. Pedicels about as long as the fruit petals, articulated a little 
below the middle, spreading half-way round the stem. Flowers dicecious. 
Sepals reflexed from the fruit petals. Enlarged petals in fruit scarious 
and coloured, suborbicular, truncate-cordate at the base, rounded at 
the apex, entire, extending far beyond the nut, faintly reticulate, with a 
very minute scale-like tubercle at the base, without ereatly thickened 
midribs. Leaves acid, green above, slightly glaucous beneath. 
In meadows, pastures, open places in woods. Very common, and 
generally distributed. 
England, Scotland, Ireland. Perennial. Spring, Summer. 
Rootstock slender, tufted, scarcely creeping. Stem slightly curved 
at the base, then erect, 1 to 8 feet high, simple up to the panicle. 
Radical leaves on long stalks; lamina 1 to 3 inches long; lowest stem 
leaves few, generally with the lamina larger than the radical ones, 2 to 6 
inches long. Female flowers 4 to 8 in a whorl: enlarged petals about 
1 inch long, generally tinged with crimson, especially round the 
margins; the sepals lying back along the petiole : nut 7'5 inch long, 
elliptical, triquetrous, chestnut, smooth, shining. Panicle of male 
flowers denser than that of the female; sepals and petals herbaceous, 
with scarious white or red margins, not enlarging after flowering. Plant 
dull green; the leaves paler and somewhat glaucous below, frequently 
tinged with red in autumn. 
The leaves are very variable in shape, but the lateral lobes are never 
divaricate, though sometimes they are separated by an obtuse, instead 
of acute angle. 
Common Sorrel. 
French, Patience oseille. German, Sawer Anpfer. 
This plant is also known by the name of Greensauce, and is so common in all fields 
and waysides, that few people are unfamiliar with its appearance or pleasant acid 
taste. The leaves of the sorrel contain a considerable quantity of binoxalate of 
potash, which gives them their acid flavour and medicinal and dietetic properties. 
They have been employed from the most distant time as a salad, and on the Continent 
are still cultivated for that purpose. In the markets of Paris sorrel is nearly as 
abundant during the season as peas are in London. In this country the leaves are rarely 
eaten, unless by children and rustics, though in Ireland they are still largely consumed 
by the peasantry with fish and milk, Though the acid principle of the sorrel is ina 
large amount poisonous, the herb does not appear to be at all unwholesome, unless 
when eaten in very large quantities, as in some few recorded cases, when it has acted 
injuriously on children. In Scandinavia, according to Dr. Clarke, the plant has been 
used in times of scarcity to put in bread. The leaves contain a little starch and 
