BOTANY AS APPLIED TO VETERINARY SCIENCE. 509 
or pod. Examples may be seen in the garden bean (Faba 
vulgaris) or the garden pea (Pimm lativum). 
This order is “at once, one of the most strictly natural, 
one of the most generally familiar, one of the most extensively 
useful, one of the most strikingly pleasing and beautiful, and 
one of the most wonderfully diversified of all the orders into 
which plants have been distributed.” Occupying a promi¬ 
nent position among the plants of this order, as affording 
a large supply of food both in a green and dried condition 
for animals, are the different varieties of trefoil or clovers , so 
named from having trifoliate leaves, and which, like trefoiled 
plants generally, " were considered by our forefathers to be 
antagonistic to evil and evil things; especially were they 
thought to be 'noisome* to witch and wizard, the united 
triune of the leaflets, doubtless, connecting the ideas with 
what was sacred.** 
There are a great many varieties of clover, all of them well 
worthy of the deepest attention of the agriculturalist, as 
affording a supply of food for animals throughout many 
months of the year. But a brief description of two of the 
principal varieties will be sufficient to give an idea of the 
characters of these plants generally. 
Trifolium repens> creeping white or Dutch clover .—This indi¬ 
genous perennial plant is found in great abundance in almost 
all situations, and is remarkable for the vitality of its seeds 
and its wide adaptation to almost every variety of soil 
and climate. Tt is distinguished by its creeping stems, which 
take root at the joints; by its tripartite leaves, having a dark- 
coloured zone at the base; by its white flowers and four- 
seeded legume. It flowers from May to September, and 
yields a large amount of nutriment; containing, according 
to Sir Humphrey Davy— 
Nutritive matter 
Mucilage 
O 
Sugar 
Gluten 
Insoluble principles 
3'8 per cent.; 
2-9 
01 
0-3 
0-3 
J) 
)) 
y y 
yy 
or— 
But being somewhat of slow growth, it is chiefly valued, 
when mixed with the grasses, for laying down permanent 
pasture. 
Trifolhim pratense, or common red clover .—Of this there are 
many cultivated varieties, both biennial and perennial. It 
is distinguished by its upright stem , which is about two feet 
high, oval leaves, and by its dense, sessile, purple flower- 
heads, having a hairy, tooth-like calyx, the inferior tooth 
xxxiii. 56 
