5 2 The B RITISH HERBAL. 
polVd by that author, juftifies the placing it in that clafs ; but when we fee that its flower confifts of a 
finnic petal, and that its fruit is a clufter of five capfules, we may fay with freedom, nature has not 
placed it between ftonecrop and woodforrel. 
There is a plant ufually confounded with the houfcleek that will naturally follow it, though in a 
fepar.te "enus j'and this is the only one with which nature has given it any alliance. 
DIVISION I. 
RITISH SPECIES; 
Wall Pennywort. 
Cotyledon radice tuhsrofa. 
The root is roundifh, tuberous, and furniflied 
with many fibres from the bottom. 
The leaves are numerous, and rife in a thick, 
regular clufter. They are fupportcd on foot- 
rtalks of three inches long, afid thefe are inferred, 
not at one fide, but in the centre, the leaf 
fpreading every way into roundncfs from them. 
Thefe leaves are of a bluifti green, prettily notch- 
. ed round the edges, and of a watery tafte. 
The ftalk is eight inches high, and is round, 
and tolerably firm. Toward the top it divides 
into two or three branches, and on thefe hang 
numerous flowers in long fpikes. 
They are fmali, grecnifh, and dented at the 
rim. 
The capfules are oblong, fwellcd, and pointed ^ 
and they contain numerous imall leeds. 
It is a native of Engl.tnd, but not common. 
I have feen it on walls near Shepon Mallet in So- 
merletfnire. 
C. Bauhine calls it Cotyledon major. J. Dau- 
hine, Cotyledo?i ftera radus tHheroJa. In Englifh 
we call it kidncyzvort^ na-ve'twortj and from its 
growing on walls and the roundnefs of its leaves, 
which are fuppoicd to refemble pieces of money, 
wall^ennyjjort. 
It is cooline 
uftd. 
and diuretick, but is not much 
DIVISION II. F O R E I G N S P E c"l"E S'. 
Yellow Navelwort. 
Cotyledon fiorc aureo. 
The root is thick, and often tuberous, and has 
numerous fibres. 
The firft leaves rife in a large clufter, and are 
of an oval figure, broadeft at the top, and dented 
at the edges. They are of a bluifli green colour, 
of a Belhy fubftance, and of an infipid tafte. 
The ftalk is round, fniooth, greenifh or 
purplifli, ereift, and but little branched. 
Its leaves ftand irregularly: they have no foot- 
ftalks, but join the ftalk by a broad bafe : they 
are of the fame ftiape v/lth thofe from the root, 
but fomewhat narrower and more indented. 
The flowers are very numerous and beautiful. 
They ftand in clufters on flcnder footftalks, 
and are tubular, divided into four (harp feg- 
ments at the edge, and of a beautiful yellow. 
Thecapfulesarefmall, and pointed. Asthefeg- 
ments of the flower are four, thefe alfo are four ; 
and the threads, which are ten in the common 
kind, are only eight in this. .Linn.'pus, how- 
ever, ranks it in the fame genus with tlie other, 
acknowledging this variation. . It is a proof that, 
however he has taught others to confider the 
number of threads conftituting the claftical, as 
well as generical characters of plants, himfeif knew 
very well they were not fuificiently determinate 
for that purpofe. 
Thofe who love needlefs diftini^tions may make 
two genera of thefe two fpecies, and give a new 
name to the laft ; but they who ftudy plants 
for ufe will hold fuch diftindlions very Highrly. 
This fpecies is a native of Egypt and the Eaft 
Indies. 
Van Royen calls it Cotyledon foUts laciniatis fio- 
rihui quadrifidis. 
They ufe it in Egypt as a diuretick, giving 
the juice in a large quantity againft the gravel. 
GENUS II. 
PERIWINKLE. 
P E R I V I N C A. 
THE flower confifl:s of a fingle petal which is of a tubular form in tlie lower part, growing wider 
upwards, and at the rim is divided into five fegments. The feeds are contained in long capfules, 
two of which follow every flower. 
l.innsEUs places this among the fentmidria momfjnia, becaufe there are in each flower five threads, 
and but a fingle filament from two rudiments of capfules. 
His general rule for the arrangement of plants according to thefe parts, is from the divifion of 
the fliyles, or number rifing from the rudiments, which he calls germina : this ftyle ferves to receive 
the dull from the buttons on the threads, and to convey it to the rudiments. The fl:ylc \nferiwinkle is 
fingle indeed, but the rudiments, which are the cflcntial parts, that being but fubfervient to them, are 
two ■ therefore, as himfeif acknowledges, this genus more juftly belongs to the digynia, or thofe which 
' have 
