﻿Lindl. Syli. p 116. — Hook, Brit. FI. p. 117. — Light f. FI. Scot. v. i. p. 158. — 

 Sibth. Fi. Oxon. p. 95.— Abbot’s FI. Bedf. p.61 . — Purt. Midi FI. v. i. p. 142. — 

 Belli. FI. Cantab. (3rd ed.) p. 117.— Hook. FI. Scot. p. 89. — Grev. FI. Edln. p. 

 65. — FI. Devon, pp. 49 & 166. — Johnston’s FI. of Benv. v. i. p. 72. — Walk. FI. 

 of Oxf. p. 85. — Bab. FI. Bath. p. 19. — Mack. Catal. of PI. of Ireland, p. 28. — 

 Sphondy'lium vulydre, Gray’s Nat. Arr. v. ii. p. 520. — Sphondylinm, Ray’s 

 Svn. p. 205. — Johnson’s Gerarde, p. 1009. 



Localities. — I n hedges, about the borders of fields, and in moist meadows. 

 Very common. 



Perennial. — Flowers in July. 



Root fusiform, thick, yellowish without, white within, running 

 deep into the ground ; aromatic, sweetish, and rather mucilagin- 

 ous. Stem from 2 to 4 or 5 feet high, upright, branched, leafly, 

 hollow, furrowed, rough with white spreading hairs. Leaves very 

 large, rough and hairy, ternate or pinnate ; leaflets usually broad, 

 somewhat heart-shaped, lobed, serrated, veiny, paler underneath. 

 Petioles ( footstalks J hairy, large, ribbed, dilated at the base into 

 a kind of membranous bag, in its younger state sheathing, and in- 

 closing the fruitstalks and umbells. Umbells flatfish, of many an- 

 gular rays, which are downy on one side, like the more numerous 

 rays of the umbellules ( partial umbells J. General Involucrum of 



1 or 2 spear-shaped, pointed, membranous, finely fringed leaflets, 

 sometimes wanting. Partial Involucrum of several similar leaflets. 

 Flowers white, greenish white, or purplish ; petals more or less 

 radiating, unequal, irregularly obcordate (inversely heart-shaped). 

 Anthers greenish. Stigmas semitransparent. Many of the flowers 

 in the central portion of each partial umbell are abortive, with no 

 traces of a germen. Fruit abundant, large, smooth, light brown, 

 with 4 purplish brown lines on each side. 



A narrow-leaved variety of this species [II. angustif olium of Sm. 

 FI. Brit.) is sometimes met with. 



Ilerdcleum sphondylium is considered a very nutritious plant, and 

 a wholesome and nourishing food for cattle. Mr. Cobbett says 

 he has fed working-horses, six or eight in number, upon this plant 

 for weeks together. It is gathered in Sussex for fattening hogs, 

 being known there by the name of Hog-weed. Cows, goats, sheep, 

 and rabbits, are also fond of it. 



G m Eli x informs us, (in his Flora Siberica ) that the inhabitants of Kamt- 

 schalka, about the beginning of July, collect the footstalks of the radical leaves, 

 and after peeling off the rind, (which is very acrid,) dry them separately in the 

 sun, and then tying them in bundles they lay them up carefully in the shade; 

 during the process of drying they become covered with a saccharine efflorescence, 

 which is considered a great delicacy. In Poland and Lithuania a kind of beer 

 is brewed from the stalks thus prepared, and when mixed with bilberries ( Vac - 

 cinium uliyinosum ) and fermented, the Russians distil a spirit f om them, 

 which Gain in says is more agreeable to the taste than that procured from corn. 

 The young shoots, when boiled, form a delicate vegetable resembling asparagus. 



Attempts have been made to manufacture sugar from this plant, which the 

 Kamschatkans call Ratsch ( sweet herb J, but 40 pounds of the dried stalks only 

 yielded a quarter of a pound of sugar. 



Two minute fungi, Puccinia Heraclei, Grev. Scot. Crypt. FI. t. 42.; and 

 Dothidea Heraclei, Frie’s Syst. Mycol. v. ii. p 556, arc parasitical on the 

 living leaves of this plant about Oxford. 



