122 Primrose ( Primidacece.) [No. 16 



An interesting little woody, evergreen, prostrate vine, 

 three to six inches in length ; not widely distributed, but 

 abundant in localities, often covering the ground in 

 flower-dotted mats of interlacing branches. 



I do not know why it is, but I have a feeling toward 

 this pretty little plant, much like one's feeling for the 

 Brownies as though they were themselves a sort of 

 Brownie tribe. I suspect the long name has something 

 to do with it — Pyxidanthera barbulata — and the blossom, 

 snuggling down as only a Brownie can, among the tiny 

 leaves. Then the abbreviation Pyxie is suggestive of 

 Puck, a first-class Brownie. And the small witches 

 choose most unique places for their homes. I have in 

 mind one such home where I used to visit them — a slope 

 of white sand on the edge of a cranberry bog, with miles 

 and miles of tall pines shutting it away from the outside 

 world — excepting on the lower side where there was a 

 break, with a far glimpse toward the ocean. If only it 

 had been a trifle later and the sun gone down, one might 

 have found himself listening for the Pyxies — or the 

 Brownies — whispering. 



No. 16.— Family PRIMULACEyE. (Primrose Fam.) 

 Genus Lysimachia, Tourn. 



Fig. 60. — Moneywort. Creeping-Charlie. [Z. nummidaria, L.] 



Flowers, large (about one inch across), yellow, wheel-shape, 

 solitary, opposite, from the axils of the leaves. 

 Corolla, deeply five-lobed, the lobes rather blunt and 

 broadly reverse egg-shape. Calyx-lobes, narrower and 

 shorter. Stamens, five, inserted on the base of the 

 corolla, and opposite its lobes. Filaments, slightly 



