36 



THE FUMITORY FAMILY. 



into numerous segments, generally 3- 

 lobed, the lobes varying in shape from 

 narrow-linear to broadly lanceolate or 

 oblong. Flowers in racemes of 1 to 2 

 inches, either terminal or opposite the 

 leaves, dense at first, but often lengthen- 

 ing much as the flowering advances. 

 Pedicels short, in the axil of a very small, 

 scale-like, white or coloured bract. Se- 

 pals small, white, or coloured like the 

 bracts, and often toothed. Petals oblong- 

 linear, closed so as to form a tubular 

 corolla, with dark-coloured tips, the spur 

 at the base giving it the appearance of 

 &* ' being attached laterally to the pedicel. 



Nut usually about a line in diameter, not quite globular, being some- 

 what compressed laterally. 



Common in cultivated and waste places in Europe and central Asia, 

 disappearing at high northern latitudes, but carried out as a weed of 

 cultivation to many parts of the globe. Abundant in England and 

 southern Scotland, but decreases much in the north. Fl. all summer 

 and autumn. It varies much in the form of the leaf- segments, in the 

 size and colour of the flower, white or red, in the size and shape of the 

 sepals, and in the precise shape of the nuts ; and several distinct species 

 are generally admitted, but they run so much one into another, that 

 there is every probability of their being mere varieties. The most pro- 

 minent British forms are — 



a. Rampant Fumitory (F. capreolata, Eng. Bot. t. 943). A large 

 luxuriant form, attaining a length of 2 or more feet ; leaflets broad ; 

 flowers 4 or 5 lines long, white or pale red, the sepals rather large, the 

 nut nearly orbicular. About hedges and walls, much more common 

 and more marked in southern Europe than in Britain. 



b. Common Fumitory. Leaf-segments neither very broad nor very 

 narrow ; flowers red, about 3 lines long ; nuts very blunt, or even de- 

 pressed at the top, rather broader than long. Connected both with 

 the preceding and the following by numerous intermediates, some 

 of which are considered as species under the names of F. media, F. agra- 

 ria, etc. 



c. Close-Jloioered Fumitory (F. densijlora or F. micranlha, Eng. Bot. 

 Suppl. t. 2876). Leaf-segments usually small; flowers smaller and in 

 closer racemes than in the common variety, the sepals remarkably 

 large in proportion to the corolla. Not uncommon in southern Europe, 

 and scattered here and there over Britain and other parts of the area 

 of the species. 



d. Small Fumitory (F. jparviflora, Vaillantii, etc., Eng. Bot. t. 590, 



