Perennial. — Flowers from April to September. 
Root spindle-shaped, very milky, of a dark brown colour on 
the outside. Leaves all radical, numerous, spreading, bright shin- 
ing green, smooth, tapering downwards, more or less deeply wing- 
cleft (pinnatifid), with sharp, unequally toothed lobes, which point 
downwards, and constitute what, in botanical language, is called a 
runcinate or lion-toothed leaf. Flower-stalks upright, smooth, 
sometimes slightly cottony, cylindrical, hollow, brittle, from 3 to 
10 inches high, 1-ftowered. Flowers large and handsome, of a 
bright deep yellow, expanding in a morning and in fine weather 
only. Outer scales of the involucrum several, linear-oblong, 
loosely recurved and wavy ; the inner becoming reflexed close to 
the stalk as the seeds ripen, leaving the light globe, nearly 2 inches 
in diameter, formed by their radiating down or pappus, quite ex- 
posed, till dispersed by the wind. Seeds a little crooked, flatfish, 
scored, prickly upwards. Papptis on a long pedicel, radiate, sim- 
ple, not feathery, shorter than the pedicel. Receptacle dotted. 
I found a plant of this species with spotted leaves, like those of 
Hieracium maculatum, in Shotover Plantations, April 16, 1831. 
A variety with fewer, and narrower leaves, with their segments 
more deeply cloven, sometimes occurs on dry grassy banks, and 
on the tops of walls. 
“ There are few plants,” observes Mr. Knapp, “ which we look upon with 
more perfect contempt than that common product of every soil, the ‘ Dande- 
lion.’ Every child knows it, and the little village groups which perambulate 
the hedges for the first offspring of the year, amuse themselves by hanging cir- 
clets of its stalks linked like a chain round their necks ; yet if we examine this 
in all the stages of its growth, we shall pronounce it a beautiful production ; 
and its blossom, though often a solitary one, is perhaps the very first that en- 
livens the sunny bank of the hedge in the opening year, peeping out from 
withered leaves, dry stalks, and desolation, as a herald . telling us that nature 
is not dead, but reposing, and will awaken to life again. And some of us, 
perhaps, can remember the pleasure it afforded us in early days, when we first 
noticed its golden blossoms under the southern shelter of the cottage hedge, 
thinking that the ‘ winter was past,’ and that ‘ the time of the singing of birds 
was come,’ and yet, possibly, when seen, it may renew some of that childish 
delight, though the fervour of expectation is cooled by experience and time. 
The form of this flower, with its ligulate petals (florets) many times doubled, 
is elegant and perfect ; the brightness and liveliness of the yellow, like the 
warm rays of an evening sun, are not exceeded in any blossom, native or fo- 
reign, that I know of ; and this, having faded away, is succeeded by a head of 
dow n, which loosened from its receptacle, and floating in the breeze, comes sail- 
ing calmly along before us, freighted w>ith a seed at its base; but so accurately 
adjusted is its bouyant power to the burden it bears, that steadily passing on its 
way, it rests at last in some cleft or cranny in the earth, preparatory to its 
period of germination, appearing more like a flight of animated creatures than 
the seed of a plant. This is a very beautiful appointment ! but so common an 
event as hardly to be noticed by us; yet it accomplishes effectually the designs 
of nature, and plants the species at distances and in places that no other con- 
trivance could so easily and fitly effect.”— Journal of a Naturalist. 
The Dandelion has sometimes, when blanched, been introduced on our tables 
in salad, but its bitterness is too powerful to allow it to be a pleasant food. 
When a swarm of locusts had destroyed the harvest in Minorca, many of the 
inhabitants subsisted on this plant ; and at Gottingen the roots are roasted, and 
used to improve the flavour of coffee, instead of Cichory, which is in universal 
use on the Continent for the same purpose. It is in some repute as a medicine ; 
and in the hepatic complaints of persons long resident in warm climates, it often 
affords very marked lelief. It is tonic, and promotes the various secretions, 
forming likewise an excellent food for milch cows ; and, from its influence over 
the excretions of the kidnies, probably arose its vulgar name, which is found 
identical in several languages. 
Uredo Cichoracearum, Grev. FI. Edin, p. 435, is common on both sides of 
the living leaves of this plant in Summer and Autumn. 
