THE WILD MIGNONETTE— continued. 
The genus Reseda has a green, gamosepalous calyx, deeply and irregularly 
divided into a varying number of lobes. Its petals are more exceptional in character. 
They are extremely unequal. They all have short, broad, orbicular, gibbous claws, 
which are sometimes green : the anterior one or two have at the apex of this a slender 
pale-coloured lamina : the lateral ones have this limb usually two- or three-cleft to 
the top of the claw ; while the broader two posterior petals have a many-cleft limb 
and a remarkable projecting ridge or ligule at the junction of claw and limb. Nectar 
is secreted in a cup-shaped cavity of the disk, which is arched over by the ligules of 
the posterior petals, being thus enclosed in a closed box, the lid of which, as Hermann 
Muller pointed out, must be raised before the honey can be extracted. A special 
genus of short-tongued bees (Prosopis) has a flat trowel-shaped proboscis, primarily 
evolved, perhaps, as an instrument for plastering the cells of its honeycomb, which 
is, however, admirably adapted, as are the proboscides of no other insects, to get the 
honey out of these blossoms. 
The small seeds are nearly circular, black, smooth, and shining, and are thus 
readily dispersed by the mere swaying of the open capsules in the wind. 
The Wild Mignonette (R. lutea Linnd) is a biennial with a branched and ribbed 
stem about a foot high and very variously lobed leaves, they being generally divided 
into three or more pinnately-arranged, linear, obtuse lobes. There are six linear 
sepals : the six petals are yellow, the posterior ones three-lobed, the lateral two-lobed, 
and the anterior ones entire : there is no perfume but a good supply of nectar which 
attracts many small insects ; and, though the flowers are homogamous, self-pollination 
is, according to Darwin, generally inoperative. The stamens vary in number from 
sixteen to twenty and curve inwards towards the gynaeceum ; and the capsule reaches 
half an inch or three-quarters of an inch in height. 
Gerard calls the plant Crambling Rocket^ probably in reference to an Old Latin 
name for it, Eruca peregrina, which would seem to imply that it spread readily by seed 
from place to place. Parkinson, however, took Gerard’s name to mean “ climbing,” 
and proposes as a substitute Base Rocket^ since, as he says, 
“Being referred to the rockets they are base and wilde herbes, but clammer not.’' 
The species is doubtfully wild in Scotland or Ireland ; and in England is practically 
confined to calcareous soils, rejoicing in sunny slopes of bare chalk. 
