6 RANUNCULACE^E. [Ratiunculus. 



few, mostly numerous. Carpels many, indefinite, indehiscent, 

 without tails, collected into a globular or elliptical head. 



Annual or perennial herbs, never shrubs, with alternate, entire, toothed or raul- 

 tiful leaves, and yellow or white, usually conspicuous flowers on peduncles termi- 

 nal, axillary or opposite the leaves. Natives of cold temperate and alpine regions 

 throuphuut tlie plobe. Most of the species are extremely acrid but scarcely poi- 

 sonous in the strict sense of the word. 



* Carpels transversely wrinkled. Petals white. 



1. B.. aquatilis,Ij. Water Crowfoot. " Stem submersed, leaves 

 capillaceo-multifid, floating ones tripartite their lobes cut, petals 

 obovate longer than the calyx, stamens 5 — 10, pericarps gla- 

 brous."— £r. Fl. p. 7. E. B. t. 101. 



Var. . "All the leaves capillaceo-multifid." — Br. Fl. R. pantothrix, DC. 

 Bertol. Fl. Ital. v. p. 675. 



Var. y. " Leaves all submersed flat roundish, capillaceo-multifid, their seg- 

 ments ail spreading in the same plane." — Brit. Fl. B. circinatus, Sm. E. Fl. 

 vol. iii. p. 55. R. circinatus, Sibth. E. B. Suppl. t. 2869 ; Fl. Dan. xiii. t. 

 22.36. Fine-trimmed water Crowfjot, Pet. Fl. Brit. tab. xxxix. fig. 3 (bona). 



In ditches and ponds, common, i^i. April. If.. 



E. Med. — About Sandown, and ditches in Sandown Level, which it covers with 

 a mantle of the purest white. Ditches about Brading. 



B. In a pool on the south side of Cothey Bottom copse between Westbridge and 

 Barnsley farm, 1848. This is exactly the R. pantothrix of Bertoloni, Fl. Ital. v. 

 p. 575. Pool near the Priory. Small pool in a field near Summerford farm, 

 1837. As the plant here grew in a very confined quantity of standing water, it is 

 clear that the finely divided form of the leaf could not have been occasioned by 

 any current to which it was exposed. 



y. Ditches about Brading Harbour. In a ditch on Brading marshes, plenti- 

 fully. This var., if such only it really be, constitutes a separate species with most of 

 the German botanists, and is principally distinguished by having the leaves finely 

 divided in a ternary arrangement into capillary segments, spreading, with a flat- 

 tish circular outline, and with such a degree of rigidity as not to collapse into a 

 pencil of hairs when removed from the water, as does R. fluviatilis of Sibth. and 

 others. Whether the remaining distinctions given by continental authors are 

 conclusive of its right to rank as a species seems very doubtful, and in a local 

 Flora the discussion would be out of place where certainty could not be thereby 

 established. It is certainly a most remarkable variety ; the whole plant assumes 

 in the water the same oircinate disposition as the leaves, whose capillary segments 

 have an unusual degree of stiffness, and seem to become coated with earthy parti- 

 cles in the same way as those of Chara, though less extensively. 



2. K. hederaceus, L. Ivy Croivfoot. " Stem submersed and 

 throwing out roots or creeping, leaves roundish Idduey-shaped 

 with 3 — .5 rounded entire lobes, petals (small) narrow scarcely 

 longer than the calyx or sometimes twice as long, stamens 5 — 12, 

 receptacle of fruit glabrous." — Br. Fl. p. 8. E. B. t. 2003. 



In similar places with the last, but less frequent. Fl. April. If. 



E. Med.— In a plashy spot not far from Fivens. In a ditch or drain between 

 Lee and Blackpan, very abundantly. Apse Heath pond. Close to Shambler's 

 farm, E. Cowes. [Brook near the Ferry, Bembridge, Dr. Bell-Sailer, Edrs.] 



W. Med.— In a drain or ditch on a moor near Blackwater mill. Very abun- 

 dantly along the road from W. Cowes to Newport in the little rill or drain at the 

 foot of the hedge a little beyond Dallimore's Gate (turnpike), fur two or three 

 hundred yards at intervals. In a pond at Northwood park close by Little Egypt, 

 Miss G. E. Kil'lerbee. Near Place farm, W. Cowes, and in the driftway from 



