Plantago.] plantaginace^. 411 



In dry, mostly calcareous pastures ; abundant on the chalk formation. Fl. 

 May— October. 2^. 



About Tenlnor and other parts of the Undercliff, the prevailing species. 

 Abundant everywhere on the chalk about Cnrisbrooke, Newport, Thorley, Cal- 

 bourne, Buccombe, &c. 



Capsules similar to those of the last, but somewhat shorter and more obtusely 

 conical. Seeds I or 2 in each cell (1, Sm. ; 2, Koch). I (ind very commonly the 

 capsule 3-seeded, in the specimens before me, by abortion of one of the seeds, 

 elliptical-oblong, plano-convex or concave on the inner side, dark brown, some- 

 what paler on the back in the centre, smooth. 



Sir James Smith recommends the pouring a drop of sulphuric acid on the crown 

 of the root for destroying this plantain on grass-plats, a valuable hint to such gar- 

 deners as have time to undertake and patience to go through with the operation. 



3. P. lanceolata, L. Ribwort. Plantain Ribgrass. " Leaves 



lanceolate tapering at both ends, scape angular, spike ovate or 



cylindrical, bracteas ovato-acute or cuspidate, two of the sepals 



keeled, tube of the corolla glabrous, dissepiment of the capsule 



plane, cells 1-seeded." — Br. Fl. p. 338. E. B. t. 507. 



(n meadows, pastures, waste ground and by roadsides ; everywhere. Fl. June, 

 July. 2/:. 



4. P. maritima, L. Sea-side Plantain. " Leaves linear grooved 

 fleshy convex below, scape rounded, spike cylindrical, bracteas 

 ovato-acuminate, sepals not winged, tube of the corolla pubescent, 

 capsule 2-celled with the dissepiment plane, cells 1-seeded." — 

 Br. Fl. p. 338. E. B. t. 175. Sibth. Fl. Grcec. ii. t. 148. 



In muddy salt-marshes, and pastures about the mouths of tide-rivers and creeks. 

 Fl. June— September. If. 



E. Med. — Marshy meadows behind the Dover, Ryde, in great plenty, 1844. 

 [St. Helens spit, by the ferry. Dr. Bell-Sailer, Edrs.] 



W.Med. — Salt-marshes about Yarmouth, frequent, 1844. By the Medina 

 above Cowes, plentiful. 



Root or rather rhizoma brownish, woody, with short stout fibres, sending up 

 erect or oblique branches or ligneous suckers crowned with leafy tufts, forming 

 dense clumps in salt-marshes. Leaves all radical, numerous, spreading, from the 

 summit of the short woody crowns or suckers of the root, dull pale green, fleshy, 

 brittle, excessively variable in size, smoothness, &c., as is the whole plant, accord- 

 ing t6 altitude or as the situation is maritime or inland ; mostly narrowly linear- 

 lanceolate, often curved or sickle-shaped, from an inch or two to a foot or upwards 

 in length, acute or acuminate, flattish or concave above towards the point, deeply 

 channelled and semicylindrical towards the dilated, memhranously winged, often 

 purplish, sheathing base, into which the leaf tapers insensibly by no evident pe- 

 tiole; strongly but blimlly keeled on the back, quite entire or distantly and obso- 

 letely denticulate, sometimes distinctly toothed, 5- or 7-nerved, marking the posi- 

 tion of as many medullary fibres which traverse the thick parenchymatous 

 substance of the leaf. * The base of each leaf, and more particularly of the 

 innermost ones, is more or less copiously overspread with a loose cottony floccu- 

 lence like that which connects the florets of several species of Poa. Scapes 1 or 

 more from each bunch of leaves, which when in flower they usually much exceed 

 in height, naked, erect, ascending or decumbent (Bertol.), wavy, terete, not stri- 

 ated, tubular but filled with loose cellular tissue within, slightly angulato-com- 

 pressed, attenuated and glabrous near the base, higher up roughish with erect or 



* These fibres are extremely strong; three of them only reuch the apex of 

 the leaf. 



