Ilypochceris.] LXV. COMPOSITE. 888 



2. H. radicata (long-rooted), Linn.; DC. Prod., vii. 91. A perennial 

 resembling R. glabra, but taller, with larger flower-heads, the leaves hispid, and 

 all the aehenes terminating in a slender beak bearing the pappus. 



Hab.: A common European species, perhaps introduced ; southern localities. 



86. ^TARAXACUM, Hall. 

 (Tarasso, to disturb ; from its supposed effect upon the blood.) 



Involucre oampanulate or oblong; bracts herbaceous, innermost 1 -seriate, erect, 

 subequal,^ sometimes connate below, unchanged after flowering, outer shorter, 

 many-seriate, often recurved ; receptacle flat, naked. Aehenes oblong, obovoid 

 or narrow, 4 to 5 angled, or the outer dorsally compressed, beaked, glabrous, 

 10-ribbed, ribs often muricate or echinate above, beak often very long and 

 slender ; pappus copious, hairs simple, slender, unequal. Scapigerous milky 

 herbs. Leaves radical, entire, sinuate or runcinate-pinnatifid. Heads solitary 

 on leafless scapes, yellow, homogamous ; florets all ligulate. 



The plants of this genus are Jew and found in temperate and cold regions. 



1. T. officinale (used as a drug), Wigg.; Boiss. H. Orient iii. 787; Hook. 

 Fl. Brit. Ind. iii. 401. The European Dandelion. Plant glabrous or the crown 

 and scape woolly, root vertical. Leaves sessile oblanceolate or linear, entire 

 toothed, pinnatifid or runcinate, lobes acute more or less denticulate. Heads 

 solitary, the inner involuoral bracts linear, often thickened or clawed at the tips, 

 outer ones ovate or linear-appressed or the outer ones reflexed. Aehenes 

 narrowly obovoid ribbed ; ribs muricate or echinate above the middle, suddenly 

 contracted into a very slender beak equalling or exceeding the body. — T. 

 Densleonis, Desf. 



Hab.: Toowoomba swamps ; Darling Downs. 

 The roots of this plant are used in medicine. 



87. *LACTUCA, Linn. 



(The name is derived from lac, milk ; referring to its milky juice.) 



Heads of numerous yellow florets, all ligulate and fertile. Involucre oampanu- 

 late ; bracts herbaceous, 2 to 3-serial, imbricate. Receptacle flat, naked. 

 Anthers sagittate at the base, not tailed. Style-branches terete. Aehenes 

 broad, glabrous, flattened, with a distinct beak and a long pappus of copious, 

 soft, fine, simple hairs.— Herbs, with milky juice, alternate often compound 

 leaves, and numerous heads in loose panicles. 



A considerable genus, widely spread over the Old World and North America. 



1. *t. Scariola (old generic name), Linn.; Boiss. Fl. Orient, iii. 800. 

 Prickly Lettuce. An erect stiff annual or biennial, 2 to 5ft. high, of a 

 more or less glaucous green, with short but spreading branches, and quite 

 glabrous except a few stiff bristles or small prickles on the edges or on 

 the midrib of the leaves. Leaves more or less spreading, varying from 

 lanceolate to broadly oblong, either bordered only with small teeth or with 

 a few short lobes or coarse teeth usually curved downwards, or deeply 

 pinnatifid with narrow lobes ; the upper ones narrow, more entire, and 

 clasping the stem with pointed auricles. Flower-hea,ds in a more or less 

 leafy panicle, sometimes long and narrow, sometimes more branched and 

 spreading. Involucres 4 or 5 lines long, of a few imbricate bracts, the short, 

 broad, outer ones passing gradually into the inner long narrow ones, Florets 



PiRT III. I, 



