GYPSOPHILA PROSTRATA. 
TRAILING GYPSOPHILA. 
Class. Order. 
DECANDRIA. TRIGYNIA. 
Natural Order. 
CARYOPHYLLEA5. 
Native of 
Height 
Flowers in 
Duration 
Cultivated 
Siberia. 
5 inches. 
July, Aug. 
Perennial. 
in 1759. 
No. 150. 
Gypsophila is derived from two Greek words, 
gupsos, lime; and phi leo, to love. Thus, a com- 
pound word, gives us direct information that the plants 
of this genus delight in a calcarious or limestone 
soil. Prostrata, trailing or lying. 
Though this plant is seldom more than a few inches 
in height, its branches are usually a foot or more in 
length. The various species of Gypsophila would 
meet with more general cultivation if it were but 
convenient to plant them in a dry gypseous soil, or 
lime rubbish ; where they would yield greater attrac- 
tion, by a more luxuriant production of flowers, with 
branches less intrusive. 
This genus has been minutely attended to by Sir 
J. E. Smith, who has made some addition to it, as 
published in the Flora Graeca, by transferring three 
species of Saponaria to it, as more correctly belong- 
ing to Gypsophila, both in habit and in the shape 
of their parts of fructification. 
It may be sufficiently increased by dividing the 
roots. A moist rich soil should be avoided, from its 
tendency, in such situation, to increase its branches 
at the expense of its blossoms. 
Hort- Kew. 2, v. 3, 74. 
