Digitalis.] scbophulariace^. 343 



2. S. aquatica, L. Water Figwort. Water Betony. " Gla- 

 brous, leaves crenate - serrate cordate - oblong obtuse, petioles 

 winged, stem 4-winged, cymes dense corymbose 8 — 15 flowered, 

 bracteas linear obtuse, sepals with a broad membranous margin, 

 scale of upper lip roundish uniform entire, capsule pointed, root 

 fibrous."— £r. Fl. p. 298. E. B. t. 854. 



By the sides of ditches, ponds and rivevs, in wet hedges, thickets and other 

 watery places ; extremely common. Fl. June — August. 71. 



Capsules like those of the preceding, but rather larger, of a deeper brown, more 

 globose and less acutely mucronato-acuminate. Seeds also rather larger and 

 darker, otherwise exactly similar to S. nodosa. 



IV. Digitalis, Linn. Foxglove. 



" Calyx in 5 deep segments. Corolla campanulate, inflated 

 beneath ; limb obliquely 4 — 5 lobed, unequal. Capsule ovate, 

 2-celled, many-seeded, 2-valved, septicidal."- — Br. Fl. 



1. D. purpurea, L. Purple Foxglove. Poppy. " Sepals ovate- 

 oblong acute 3-nerved downy, corolla obtuse scabrous externally, 

 upper lip scarcely divided, lower one with ovate rounded seg- 

 ments, leaves ovate-lanceolate crenate or serrate downy." — Br. 

 Fl. p. 299. E. B. t. 1297. Curt. Fl. Lond. i. fasc. 1. 



/3. Flowers white. 



In dry hilly or heathy pastures, woods, hedges, and on banks by roadsides ; 

 common in many places* on gravel or sand. FLMaj — August. <y. 



E. Med. — Not unfrequent in the immediate vicinity of Ryde. Hedgebanks 

 along the high road between St. John's and the turning off to Westridge, and 

 along the road to Smallbrook. 



W.Med. — Common about Newport, on St. George's down, and profusely 

 below Marvel copse. Woods near Norris castle, abundant. Rowledge. 



j3. About Steephill, A. Hambrough, Esq. A solitary specimen on the Wilder- 

 ness, June, 1842. 



Root a bundle of yellowish, woody, copiously branched fibres, small for the size 

 of the plant, and creeping horizontally just below the surface. Stem erect, simple 

 or occasionally with a few short branches below, from about .3 or 4 to 6 or 7 feet 

 high or even higher, and from a finger thick to an inch in diameter at base, firm, 

 hollow below, bluntly angular by the decurrence of the leaves and flower-stalks, 

 greenish or purplish gray, and covered with an extremely short close pile or 

 pubescence, consisting of erect gland-tipped hairs. Leaves alternate, ovate or 

 oblong-lanceolate, soft, dull green, wrinkled and very finely pubescent above with 

 erect simple hairs, much paler and almost hoary underneath with longer more 

 copious pubescence, especially on the prominent network of veins, scarcely acute, 

 evenly crenate, the serratures very obtuse and rounded, with a small callosity ; 

 lower stem- and root-leaves large, on stout, decurrent, winged, semiterete petioles 

 deeply channelled above, about as long as the leaf, woolly ; upper stem-leaves 

 smaller, on shorter stalks, at length becoming sessile and bractiform. Flowers 

 very large and numerous, gracefully drooping and imbricated in a crowded uni- 

 lateral and terminal raceme or spike often several feet in length. Peduncle sin- 

 gle-flowered, nodding, cylindrical, decurrent, suberect in fruit, mostly about as 



* Mr. Thomson of Manchester, in an essay on the " Relations between Geolo- 

 gical Strata and the Plants growing on their superincumbent Soils " (Loudon's 

 Mag. of Nat. Hist. vol. iii. p. 418), asserts that, of this beautiful, but, as he calls 

 it, noxious flower, the Isle of Wight scarcely boasts a single specimen ! 



