THE COMMON AND ALPINE LADY’S-MANTLE— continued. 
surface and are then retained, by a tuft of hairs, from running down the leaf-stalk. 
This feature, to which the plant owes its Old English name Syndow or “Ever-dewy ” 
and its modern Border name Dew-cup, is not produced by dew or rain, but by water 
distilled out of the leaf itself in the process of transpiration by special “ water- 
stomata ” or pores at the points of the serrations. The name Syndow is identical with 
that which has been corrupted into Sundew in the case of Drosera. 
The rhizomes of the perennial species, such as the two here represented, are 
astringent and mucilaginous, and have, therefore, been employed as an anti- 
spasmodic ; but there seems little to justify the application to these humble herbs of 
a name so important as Tragus’s Alchemilla — a prettily formed Latin diminutive — or 
rather of its original the Al-kemelyeh of the Arab physicians, as if they embodied the 
whole science and practice of alchemy. 
How an early Latin name runs through the modern languages of Europe is 
illustrated by the Pes leonis of Brunfels and Fuchs, which appears as Pied de lion in 
Lyte, as Lion’s paw in Gerard, Leuwenklauw in Dutch, and Lowenfuss in modern 
German ; whilst that the modern English Lady’ s-mantle was originally Our Lady’s 
Mantle is manifest, not only from the testimony of the ultra-Protestant William 
Turner, but curiously enough from the popular names in two Protestant countries, 
the Onze Vrouve mantel of the Dutch and the Mariekapa of Sweden. Turner says ; — 
‘‘ Alchimilla other wyse called Pcs leonis, is called in english our Ladies Mantel or syndow. It groweth in middowes like 
a Mallowe/’ 
The root-leaves of the Common Lady’s-mantle (Alchemilla vulgaris Linne), the 
larger of the two species represented on our Plate, may reach six inches in diameter 
and eighteen inches in the length of their stalks ; and the stipules of the sessile cauline 
leaves unite by both edges so as to form a leafy ochrea, or sheath, round the stem. 
The whole plant is slightly hairy ; but the leaves are green on their under surfaces. 
Although occurring in moist lowland pastures, this species finds its way up to 3,600 
feet in the Scottish Highlands. A smaller, more silkily pubescent form, often 
hitherto confused with it, is the A.filicaulis of Buser. 
The pretty little Alpine Lady’s-mantle {A. alpina Linne), with its deeply divided 
leaves with silvery under surfaces, is, on the other hand, a typically Arctic-alpine 
species. It occurs as a chomophyte on exposed rock surfaces, with Dryas, Sibbaldia, 
the purple-flowered Saxifraga oppositifolia, and the Woolly Fringe-moss [Rhacomitrium 
lanuginosum Bridel), Reindeer-moss and Dwarf Willows, up to altitudes of 3,000 feet 
or more, on Ben Lawers and other Highland peaks, where, as Dr. W. G. Smith has 
pointed out, it is often dominant over large areas ; but, carried down by mountain 
streams, it may also occur at not more than 400 feet above the sea. Its silvery 
foliage will add a grace to any rock-garden ; but it requires good drainage. 
