92 ENGLISH BOTANY. 
Suffolk; Carrow, Norfolk; and Godstowe Nunnery, Oxford. Yorkshire 
seems to be the most northern locality where it has been noticed. 
[England.] Perennial. Summer. 
Rootstock woody, scarcely as thick as the little finger. Stems stout, 
18 inches to 2 fect high. Leaves 3 to 6 inches broad, and about the 
same length, very deeply cordate, the basal lobes projecting laterally 
inwards till they nearly touch each other. Flowers in fascicles of 4 to 
8. Perianth about one inch long or a little more, pale greenish yellow. 
Fruit ovoid. Fruit pedicel recurved. Leaves pale green, somewhat 
glaucous beneath; plant glabrous. 
Common Birthwort. 
French, Aristoloche clématite. German, Gemeine Osterluzet. 
The name of this plant and its supposed remedial powers are the suggestions of the 
doctrine of signatures, by the shape of the corolla. The root is aromatic and bitter, 
but not ungrateful to the palate. It has been used in the Portland powder for the 
cure of gout, but not without producing effects more formidable than the original 
disease. The ancients attributed great virtues to it. Gerard tells us that it is a 
singular and much-used antidote against the bite of the Rattlesnake, or rather Adder 
or Viper, whose bite is very deadly, and therefore, by the providence of the Creator, 
“hee hath upon his taile a skinny dry substance, parted into eels, which contain some 
loose, hard, dry bodies that rattle in them (as if one should put little stones or pease 
into a stiffe and very dry bladder), that so he may by this noise give warning of his 
approach, the better to be avoided ; but if any be bitten, they know not stand in need 
of no better antidote than this root, which they chew and apply to the wound, and 
also swallow some of it downe, by which means they quickly overcome the maligmtie 
of this poisonous bite, which otherwise would in a very short time prove deadly. 
Many also commend the use of this against the plague, smallpox, measles, and such 
like maligne and contagious diseases.” An opinion is said to prevail in France that 
the produce of vineyards in which this plant abounds becomes deteriorated in quality. 
ORDER LXVIL—EMPETRACES. 
Small evergreen heathlike diffusely branched: shrubs. Leaves 
crowded, alternate or subverticillate, linear-acerose, entire. Stipules 
none. Flowers diccious, rarely perfect or polygamous, small, solitary 
or in small clusters in the axils of the leaves, very rarely in terminal 
clusters. Perianth double, subscarious, in 2 rows with 3 segments in 
each row, rarely with only 2. Stamens 3 in the male flowers, rarely 2; 
in the female absent or merely rudimentary, hypogynous; anthers 
2-celled, opening longitudinally. Ovary rudimentary in the male 
flowers, in the female solitary, free from the perianth, seated on a 
disk, 3-, 6-, or 9-celled, rarely 2-celled; ovules solitary in each cell, 
