﻿A Shrub. — Flowers in July and August. 



Root woody, creeping widely. Stems many, one or two feet 

 high, slender, smooth, leafy, between round and angular, branched. 

 Leaves simple, scattered, nearly sessile, spear-shaped, of a deep 

 shining green : mostly smooth, but sometimes having a few hairs 

 at the edges and underneath. Flowers on short axillary stalks, 

 forming a kind of leafy spike at the summit of the branches. 

 Calyx (fig. 1.) smooth, angular, deeply 5-cleft, with a pair of small 

 awl-shaped bracteas near its base. Petals of a uniform bright 

 yellow ; standard (vexillum) (fig. 2.) oblong, blunt, with a shallow 

 notch at the summit, wings (fig. 3.) oblong ; keel (fig. 4.) com- 

 pressed. Stigma a little knob. Odd stamen very deeply sepa- 

 rated, (see fig. 5.) Legume (figs. 7 and 8.) smooth, somewhat 

 compressed, and containing several seeds. 



The whole plant atfords the dyer a good yellow colour, and with 

 Woad ( Isatis tinctoria ) a good green. When Cows feed on it, 

 their milk, and the butter or cheese made from it, are fsaid to be 

 very bitter. Dr. Withering says, that a dram and a half of the 

 powdered seeds is mildly laxative ; and that a decoction of the 

 plant is sometimes diuretic, and therefore has proved serviceable 

 m dropsical cases. A salt prepared from the ashes is recommended 

 in the same disorder. It is esteemed in Russia as a cure for 

 hydrophobia. The author of that interesting and very popular 

 work, “the Journal of a Naturalist,” informs us that this plant “ is 

 seldom eaten by cattle, except in cases of great necessity, and re- 

 mains untouched, if other food be obtainable, giving a deceitful 

 appearance of verdure to a naked pasture.” — “ I know not,” says 

 the same writer, “ any use to which it is applicable but for the 

 dyer. Our poorer people a few years ago used to collect it by 

 cart loads about the month of July ; and the season of ‘ wood- 

 waxen ’ was a little harvest to them : but it interfered greatly with 

 our hay-making. Women could gain each about 2 shillings a day, 

 clear of all expenses, by gathering it ; but they complained that it 

 was a very hard and laborious occupation, the plant being drawn 

 up by the roots, which are strongly interwoven in the soil. The 

 use of this dyer’s broom is to prepare woollen cloths for the re- 

 ception of another colour. It communicates to the article a dull 

 yellow, which will then, by being dipped into another liquor, or 

 composition, according to the shade required, receive a green hue. 

 Vegetable filaments, cotton, flax, &c., are very differently formed 

 from those threads afforded by animals, as silk and wool, and are 

 differently disposed to receive colours. The dye, that will give a 

 fine colour to the one, is perhaps rejected by the other ; and this 

 plant is rarely or never used by the dyer for cotton articles.” 



A very curious insect, Centrotus Genistce of Curt Brit. Entomol. 

 t. 313, is sometimes found upon this plant. 



