DICTAM^NUS FRAXINEL'LA. 
RED FRAXINELLA. 
Class. Order. 
DECANDBIA. MONOGYNIA. 
Natural Order. 
RCTACEVE. 
Native of 
Height. 
Flowers in 
Duration. 
Cultivated 
Germany. 
3 feet. 
June, July. 
Perennial. 
in 1596. 
No. 307. 
The word Dictamnus was used by the Greeks, 
and its original import is now uncertain. It is the 
name of a Cretan city, and has been said to be given 
to a plant which was abimdant there ; but Linneus, 
when he gave it to the present plant, observed that 
it was deduced from the Greek tiktein, to bring 
forth fruit. Fraxinella, is the diminutive of Fraxinus, 
signifying a little ash ; a name used for this plant by 
Tournefort and others, from its pinnate leaves. 
The Fraxinella is known to every one conver- 
sant with herbaceous plants; and is generally ad- 
mired for the fragrance of its entire herbage, which 
to most persons is very agreeable. Another of the 
well-known qualities belonging to it is the inflamma- 
bility of the exhalation from the little resinous glands 
with which it is covered. In very dry warm weather, 
this will be seen to take fire, on bringing a candle 
near to it; but the best method of showing this 
property, is to gather a portion of the plant, in dry 
weather, and hold it near to a small candle, in a room 
that is otherwise dark. 
It may be divided, or raised from seeds, and re- 
quires no peculiar management. 
Hort. Kew. 2, v. 3, 34. 
