Root fibrous. Stems numerous, from 2 to 6 or 8 inches long, 
spreading on the ground in every direction, round, smooth, jointed, 
leafy, branched and proliferous, taking root at the joints as it creeps 
along ; in dry situations it is more upright. Leaves from a quarter 
of an inch to half an inch long, opposite, combined by their mem- 
branous bases (see fig. 7), somewhat fleshy, 3-nerved, strap-shaped, 
blunt, with a very minute bristly point, usually quite smooth, but 
occasionally the margins, especially of the lower leaves, are fringed 
with very minute, short, distant, bristly hairs. Peduncles ( flower - 
stalks ) solitary, axillary, slender, smooth, longer than the leaves, 
single-flowered. Flowers very small, drooping before they expand. 
Calyx spreading, with egg-shaped, concave, blunt sepals. Petals 
white, very small, entire, spreading, scarcely half the length of the 
sepals ; sometimes entirely wanting. Capsule egg-shaped, longer 
than the calyx, thin, 1-celled, 4-valved, the valves, when open, 
have so much the appearance of petals, that it is possible to mis-* 
take them. Seeds very minute. 
It sometimes occurs with 5 sepals, 5 petals, and 5 stamens. 
Villars says, that he has often seen this plant without any 
petals, with a 5-sepaled calyx, 10 stamens, and 5 pistils, thus ap- 
proaching to spergula. The calyx and other parts of the flower 
appear in this case to increase at the expense of the corolla ; the 
latter, however, is often wanting without an augmentation of the 
other parts. 
Mr. W. Curtis remarks, that few plants assume a greater variety 
of appearance than this, but that in all situations the singular ap- 
pearance of the seed-vessels, placed on the calyx, like a cup on a 
saucer, will easily distinguish it. 
It is a native every where throughout Europe ; on the North- 
west coast of America, and on the banks of the Columbia. 
Being fond of a sandy and gravelly soil, it is a troublesome little 
weed in garden-walks and paved courts, where it flowers and seeds 
during the whole Summer, 
There is a curious and very pretty variety of this species of sa- 
gina sometimes cultivated in gardens, but, I believe, it is rather rare ; 
it has a very full flower, and resembles a double white rose in mi- 
niature. — In a flower of a plant of this variety, which is now (Aug. 
22, 1836) in flower in the Oxford Botanic Garden, I counted no 
less than 44 perfectly-formed petals, all of which, in a fully ex- 
panded state, occupied a circle of only one-tenth part of an inch in 
diameter. — This delicate little Fairy-flower was first found by the 
late Rev. H. Davies, author of “Welsh Botanology,” on a green 
near Beaumaris, in the Isle of Anglesey, in July, 1817. A small 
specimen of this variety is represented at fig. 8 of the annexed plate. 
No one can contemplate the beauty and delicacy of this extra- 
ordinary little flower, without being captivated by the wisdom ma- 
nifested by that beneficent Creator, who 
“ has displayed 
In il such power and skill with beauty's charms array’d.” 
