XCI.— SCURVY-GRASS. 
Cochlearia officinalis Linne. 
T he Cruciferte are one of the more extensive Families as to number of species 
and one of the most widely distributed. Comprising about eighteen hundred 
species, in some two hundred genera, the Family consists mainly of herbaceous 
plants — annual, biennial, or perennial — with some shrubs, and is less well represented 
in the Tropics and in the South than in the Temperate regions of the North. 
Though exhibiting unmistakable affinities with other Families of the Rhceadales^ 
especially with the Capparidaceic^ the Cruciferce form a singularly natural group, i.e. 
they are all very closely similar in structure with very few marked departures from 
the type. Their affinities in structure are accompanied by equal relationship in 
composition. Pungent oils and compounds rich in sulphur, readily disengaging 
sulphuretted hydrogen on boiling, are characteristic not only of Cruciferce but to 
some extent also of the Caper and Mignonette Families. No member of the 
Crucifer, e is poisonous : many of them are favourite and wholesome articles of food ; 
and in former days of long sea-voyages and much salt meat they were important 
remedies for scurvy. 
The leaves of the Cruciferce are generally scattered, exstipulate, and simple, 
though often deeply divided ; and the inflorescence is an ebracteate raceme, 
sometimes adding to the conspicuousness of the small flowers by the corymbose 
lengthening of the lower peduncles which brings them more to one level. The 
flowers are mostly white or yellow, or less commonly pink, red, or lilac, the com- 
bination of the two series of colouring-matters producing the remarkable orange- 
browns of the Wallflower. The type of floral arrangement is singularly uniform, 
the flowers being complete, heterochlamydeous, and perfect. The calyx consists of 
two whorls of two sepals each, the outer pair being antero-posterior, while the inner 
pair are often provided with honey-pouches or spurs at their bases. The corolla is a 
single whorl of four petals arranged in the diagonal planes of the flower, i.e. opposite 
the spaces between the four sepals, the petals often having a long claw with the limb 
expanded at right angles to it in a flat cruciform manner which gives its name to the 
Family. The stamens are in two whorls, the outermost consisting of two, opposite 
to the lateral (inner) sepals. These two, having to curve their filaments to avoid 
two honey glands on the floral receptacle between their bases and the ovary, appear 
shorter than those of the inner whorl. This latter appears to consist of four longer 
stamens, whence the term tetradynamous (from the Greek rerpa?, tetras., four, and 
Sum/At?, dunamis, strength) and the name of the Linnaean Class Tetradynamia, which 
corresponds very nearly with the Natural Family Cruciferce. These four stamens 
are in two pairs placed antero-posteriorly, each pair having a stamen on either side 
of the median plane of the flower. There is much evidence to show that each pair 
is one bifurcating stamen. There are two united lateral carpels forming a superior 
