PAPA'VER COMMUTA'TUM. 
CHANGEABLE POPPY. 
Class. Order. 
POLYANDRIA. MONOCYNIA. 
Natural Order. 
PAPAVERACE*. 
Native of 
Height. 
Flowers in 
Duration. 
' Introduced 
Iberia. 
1 foot. 
September. 
Annual. 
1 in 1839. 
No. 776. 
The word Papaver, it is generally believed, arose 
out of the Celtic papa, pap, or thickened milk, on 
account of the juiceof the Poppy being' used in child- 
ren’s food to make them sleep. Or, more directly, 
the milky juice itself of the Poppy may have obtain- 
ed for it the appellation, independently of any 
consideration of its uses. Inconstancy of colour, 
is natural to several allied species. 
The firstmention we have of the Papaver commu- 
tation is in the Petersburg^ Seed List, drawn up by 
Fischer and Meyer, for 1837, where it occurs 
under the name we have adopted. It is, however, 
believed by C. A. Meyer to be a variety of Papaver 
rheeas. Be this as it may it is a showy annual, 
sent from the Botanic Garden of Berlin. It re- 
quires but to be sown in April, in a light soil, and 
it will flower in August and September. 
The heads or capsules of the Papaver rheeas, or 
common Corn Poppy, contain a milky fluid similar 
to that produced by the Papaver somniferum, but 
of inferior strength when formed into Opium ; and 
from its bright scarlet blossoms a medicine, known 
as the Syrupus rheeados, is prepared, simply by 
