30G APOCYNACE^. [Vinca. 



in fining, which is not the case with the other ; their margins, as in that, minutely 

 defle'xed, but fringed with fine, white, valhev rigid hairs, otherwise perfectly 

 smooth and glabrous, truly ovale, the upper leaves ovate-lanceolale ; rounded or 

 sometimes very slightly cordate at base, very pointed and acute but nut acumi- 

 nate. Petioles fringed, like the edge of the leaves, with fine white and spreading 

 hairs, sometimes bearing in their axils a rudimentary branch like an oblong gland, 

 for which it has been mistaken, besides which there is a pair of small, curved, 

 greenish glands, pointing forward, about the centre of the leafstalk or sometimes 

 towards its suinmit, usually not opposite each other, and often there is another 

 smaller and compressed pair in the axil of the petiole. Peduncles glabrous 

 terete, as long (longer. Curt.) as or mostly shorter than the leaves, solitary, 

 single-flowered, axillary or rarely opposite, erect in flower, afterwards decurved. 

 Cali/x deeply cleft into 5 subulate, acute, single-nerved segments, that are fringed 

 with white patent hairs along the edges, and have for the most part a pair of 

 small tooth-like points near their base ; variable in length, half or three-fourths 

 as long as the tube of the corolla. Corolla similar to that of V. minor, but much 

 larger, from about 1^ to 2 or 2j inches across, of a rather paler blue in general, 

 the segments of the limb with one of the corners sometimes acute or even pointed, 

 the crown at the summit of the lobe deeper or more prominent between the seg- 

 ments and slightly emarginate, not lobed, the greater part of its margin free, not 

 adnate to the segments as in the other. Stamens exactly as i'n V. minor, but the 

 summit of the anthers (connectivum) is thicker than in that, slightly gibbous or 

 convex underneath, hollow or pouched, the hairs on the back yell(l\^'ish ; pollen- 

 globules diaphanous, cohering or agglutinated, roundish and subangular. Ovary 

 and its two accompanying glands as in the other species.* Style as in V. minor, 

 hut more slender, and, as well as the lower half of the disk on its top, dull orange- 

 coloured ; stigma, as in that, a tuft of white hairs, but arranged in 5 plait-like lobes 

 and angles pointed underneath, and having a stellate appearance above. Fol- 

 licles precisely like those of V. minor, but larger, from about 1 J to 2 inches long. 

 Seedsf 2 or 3, exactly as in V. minor. 



2. V. minor, L. Lesser Pei-iwinhle.l Vect. Sengreen.% Sujffru- 

 tescent, stems jirocumbent, flowering shoots erect, leaves ever- 

 green elliptic-lanceolate quite glabrous, flowers stalked, calj'x-seg- 

 meuts much shorter than the tube of the corolla lanceolate entire 

 glabrous, stigma rounded. Sm. E. Fl. p. 399. Br. Fl. p. 264. 

 Lincll. Syn. p. 176. E. B. xiii. t. 917. Curt. Fl. Lond. fasc. 3, 

 t. 16. 



In woods, copses, groves, and on hedgebanks in lanes ; very rare in a perfectly 

 native state with us, less so in a naturalized condition. Fl. March — October. 

 Fr. Auffust, September. 71. 



E. Med. — At St. John's, in the narrow slip of wood between the house and the 



* Smith and others consider the germen as double, in other words that there 

 are two, because the seed is contained in two separate or distinct follicles. The 

 style, too, has a longitudinal furrow, and the stigma a transveise slit or chink, 

 indicating a double set of organs united throughout. 



f I finil the seeds of this species, like those of the other, attacked by some 

 insect, which enters the follicles when still unripe. 



\ The leaves supply nourishment to the larva of the beautiful Oleander hawk- 

 moth {Sphinx Neni, L.), of which four instances of the capture in England have 

 happened within these last few years ; once of the caterpillar, at Teignmouth, and 

 subsequently of three of the perfect insects, at Dover, Southampton and the Isle of 

 Wight, all of which I have myself seen. The Isle-of- Wight specimen was found 

 by a boy at Saudown, and is now in excellent preservation, in the possession of 

 my friend Miss Lucas, of Byde. 



§ Siniigrun is the German name for Periwinkle, 



