DIGITALIS PURPUREA-FOXGLOVE. 
« 
CLASS, DIDYNAMIA ; ORDER, ANGIOSPERMIA. 
NATURAL ORDER, SCROPHULARIACE^. 
Gen. Char. Calyx, five parted. Corel, bell form, five cleft, 
ventricose. Capsule, egg shaped, two celled. Spec. Char. 
Sepals, ovate, acute. Corol, obtuse, superior lip entire. Leaves 
rough and somewhat spear-shaped. 
This genus contains many species, not one of which is American. 
The generic name is derived from a word signifying thimble, in 
allusion to the form of the flowers. Its common name is a cor- 
ruption of Fairy’s Thimble. This biennial plant is a native of 
the mountainous and sandy regions of Europe. It has a simple 
stem, leafy below, covered with light down, which induced the 
poets to make it the emblem of youth. The leaves are alternate, 
of an oval, spear-shape, those from the root attaining a conside- 
rable size. It flowers on a spike. Its corolla, says Lindley, is a 
large, inflated body, with its throat spotted with rich purple, and 
its border divided obliquely into five very short lobes, of which the 
two upper are the smaller ; its four stamens are of unequal length ; 
and the style divided into two lobes at the upper end. A number 
of long, glandular hairs cover the ovary, which contains two cells 
and a great quantity of valves. 
Phillips remarks, that this beautiful but deleterious plant, which 
so highly ornaments the banks of hedge-rows and borders of 
woods, has been taken into the pleasure grounds to embellish the 
no 
