262 THE COMPOSITE FAMILY. | Hypocheris. — 
Britain, but found in a ‘few spots from Westmoreland and North Wales to 
Essex and Cornwall. 7. summer. . 
ee 
XXXIV. LACTUCA. LETTUCE. 
Annual or perennial herbs, glabrous or with very few stiff bristles; the 
stems leafy, erect, and branched, with (in the British species) numerous 
small heads of yellow or blue flowers. Involucre narrow, of a few imbricated 
bracts, containing very few florets. Achenes flattened or four-sided, 
tapering into a slender beak, with a pappus of numerous white and silky 
(very discoloured, stiff, and bristly) simple hairs. 
A genus widely spread over southern Europe and central Asia. It has the 
flattened achenes of Sonchus, from which the only positive distinctive 
character is the beak of the achenes, but the narrow involucres and few 
florets generally give it a different habit. 
Leaves thin, on long stalks, with a broad terminal lobe. Panicle 
slender. Flowersyellow. Beak shorter than the achene itself 1. Z. muralis. 
Leaves mostly sessile, rather stiff, often prickly. Panicle rigid. 
Beak as Jong as or longer than the achene. 
Panicle rather loose, oblong or spreading. Beak about the length 
of the achene . : é ; : : : ; : 5 . 2. DL. scariola. 
Panicle almost reduced to a long, clustered spike. Flowers yellow. 
Beak about twice the length of the achene 3. DL. saligna, 
Leaves pinnatifid, with a triangular terminal lobe. Flowers blue. 
BeakO  . . . stubeave : acai . 4, L, alpina. 
Our garden Lettuces are luxuriant forms, produced by long cultivation of 
one or perhaps two southern species, which have not been as yet satisfac- 
torily identified, some botanists believing them to be cultivated varieties of 
L, Scariola. 
1, G. muralis, Fresen. (fig. 586). Wall Lettuce.—A glabrous, erect 
annual or biennial, aout 2 feet high, with slender branches, forming a loose, 
terminal panicle. Leaves few and thin, with a broadly triangular, toothed 
or lobed, terminal segment, anda few irregular smaller ones along the stalk ; 
the upper leaves narrow, entire or toothed, clasping the stem with prominent 
auricles. Flower-heads small, on slender pedicels. Involucres about 5 lines 
long, of 5 equal, linear bracts, with 1, 2, or 3 very small outer ones, con- 
taining 4 or 5 florets. Beak of the achenes much shorter than the achene 
itself. 
In woods and shrubby places, in Europe and Russian Asia, extending ~ 
far into the north, although not an Arctic plant. Not uncommon in Eng- 
land, Perth and Stirling in Scotland, and only known in Wicklow and Louth 
in Ireland. Fl. summer. 
2, G. Seariola, Linn. (fig. 587). Prickly Lettuce.—An erect, stiff annual 
or biennial, 2, 3, or even 4 feet high, of a more or less glaucous green, with 
short but spreading branches, and quite glabrous, except a few stiff bristles 
or small prickles on the edges or on the midrib of the leaves. Leaves more 
or less spreading, but often twisted so as to be vertical instead of horizontal, 
varying from lanceolate to broadly oblong, either bordered only with small 
teeth, or with a few short lobes or coarse teeth usually curyed downwards, 
or deeply pinnatifid with few narrow lobes; the upper ones narrow, more 
entire, and clasping the stem with pointed auricles. Flower-headsin amore — 
or less leafy panicle, sometimes long and narrow, sometimes more branched 
