DIDYNAMIA— GYMNOSPERMIA. Mentha. 77 



M. piperita vulgaris. Sole Menth. 19. t. 8. 



M. spicis brevioribus et habitioribus, foliis Menthae fuscae, sapore 

 fervido piperis. Rail Syn. ed. 2. 124. ed. 3. 234. 1. 10./. 2. 

 . M. fervida nigricans, breviore folio et spica. Herb. Sherard. 



M. aquatica sive Sisymbrium. Bauh. Hist. v. 3. p. 2. 223. f. 



y. Leaves ovate, slightly heart-shaped. Spikes more acute. 



M. piperita sylvestris. Sole Menth. 53. t. 24. 



M. hircina. Hull ed. 1. 127. 



In watery places. 



a. In Hertfordshire, Dr. Eales ; Ray. In a swampy place on 

 Lansdown, near Bath, called the wells ; also by the side of the 

 Avon, in Newton mead. Mr. Sole. At Hauxton, Cambridge- 

 shire. Rei\ R. Relhan. In a mountain rivulet in Bonsall dale, 

 near Matlock bath, Derbyshire, 1790. 



(3. In Essex, Dale. By Wandsworth river. Herb. Sherard. About 

 Bath, and between Wells and Glastonbury ; also in Chiltern 

 bottom, Wilts. Mr. Sole. 



y. At Lyncomb Spa, and various other wet places about Bath. 

 Mr. Sole. At the south-west corner of Saham meer, near Wat- 

 ton, Norfolk. 



Perennial. August, September. 



Stems nearly erect, branched, roughish with recurved hairs, ^nd 

 generally 2 or 3 feet, in y 4 feet, high. Leaves all stalked, 

 dark green, ovate, acute, varying in breadth, sharply serrated ; 

 smoothish above ; paler and more hairy beneath ; never downy 

 nor shaggy like M. sylvestrif. Spikes bluntish ; interrupted and 

 leafy in their lower part ; in /3 short, dense and obtuse, com- 

 monly with one very distant whorl; in y acute, with 2 or more 

 .such. Brncteas lanceolate, fringed. Flower-stalks either per- 

 fectly smooth, or in their upper part only a little hairy. Cal. 

 slender, furrowed, covered with pellucid dots, quite smooth in 

 its lower half, but the dark-purple teeth, and in y the upper 

 part of the tube, are more or less densely hairy. Cor. purplish. 

 Statn. in all my specimens short ; style long. 



The warm camphor-like scent and flavour of this species, suc- 

 ceeded by a coolness, are familiar to every body, and the essen- 

 tial oil, or distilled water, of Pepper Mint enters into various 

 cordial or medical preparations. The variety y is less agreeable 

 than the others. England has always been known as the coun- 

 try of the true M. piperita. What supplies its place in the north 

 of Europe, is merely a variety of M. hirsuta having a similar 

 odour; and this is named piperita in the Linnaean herbarium. 

 Mr. Sole justly criticises the figure in Ray's Synopsis, as having 

 the leaves of the true piperita with the iri/lorescence of hirsuta ; 

 or rather perhaps of piperita (3. But he was not aware of all the 

 figures of that 3d edition having been drawn and engraved by 

 the hand of Dillenius, long after the time of Ray. The styles in 



