242 



VALERIANEjE 



*2. Kentranthus (Spur- Valerian). — Glabrous, leafy plants ; 

 flowers in terminal, panicled cymes, bracteolatej pappus deciduous ; 

 corolla with 5 unequal lobes, a long compressed tube, and a 

 spur. (Name from the Greek kentron, a spur, anthos, a flower.) 

 1.* K. ruber (Red Spur- Valerian). — Glaucous, 1 — 2 feet high ; 

 leaves entire, ovate, acute ; flowers crimson, deep rose-red, or 

 white. — Chalk-pits, railway-banks, limestone-quarries, and old 

 garden-walls ; common, but not indigenous. A very handsome 

 garden plant. — Fl. June — September. Perennial. 



2.* K. Calcitrapa, differing 

 chiefly in having pinnatifid 

 cauline leaves, occurs as a 

 garden escape at Eltham, Kent. 

 3. Valerianella ' (Corn- 

 salad). — Small plants, repeat- 

 edly forked ; leaves simple ; 

 flowers minute, solitary or in 

 crowded bracteate cymes in 

 the forks of the branches ; 

 calyx generally distinguishable 

 as teeth on the fruit ; corolla 5- 

 lobed, obconic, polysymmetric ; 

 fruit generally of 2 empty 

 barren and 1 fertile (1 -seeded) 

 chambers. (Name, a diminu- 

 tive of Valeriana.) 



1: V. olitbria (Common 

 Corn-salad, Lamb's Lettuce). 

 — Smooth, flaccid, brittle, 

 4 — 12 in. high ; leaves long and 

 narrow, a little toothed near 

 the base, the upper ones clasp- 

 ing the stem ; flowers very 

 minute, pale lilac, in dense terminal leafy heads ; the fertile 

 chamber of the ovary thick and corky at the back, crowned by 

 the 3 calyx-teeth. — Cornfields; common. It is sometimes 

 cultivated as a salad. — Fl. May, June. Annual. 



2* V. eriocdrpa (Woolly-fruited Corn-salad), differing in 

 having a hairy fruit, crowned by a large, nearly regular, campanu- 

 late calyx, and with its fertile chamber not corky, occurs 

 occasionally, but is not native. — Fl. June. Annual. 



3.* V. carindta Keeled-fruited Corn-salad), differing in its 

 blue flowers and oblong, boat-shaped fruit, crowned by 1 sepal, 

 with its fertile chamber not corky and the tw 7 o barren ones in- 



valerian£lla olit6ria 

 (Common Corn-salad, Lamb's Lettuce). 



