POLYANDRIA. DIGYNIA. Poteeium. 
663 
POTE'RIUM.* * Stamens and pistils in different flowers on the 
same plant: Calyx four leaves: Bloss. with four di¬ 
visions: 
B. Starn. thirty to forty. 
F. Drupa juiceless, beneath, one or two-celled, 
formed of the indurated tube of the blossom. 
P. sanguisor'ba. Thornless: stems somewhat angular. 
j Dicks. H. S. — (E. Bot. 860. E.)— Ludw. 197— Kniph. 1— Curt. — Matth. 
1034— Bod. 105. 1 —Lob. Obs. 412. 3 ; and Ic. i. 718. 2—Ger. Em. 1045. 
1— Park. 582. 1— Ger. 889. 1— Sheldr. — Gars. 457— Fuchs. 789 —rJ.B. 
iii. b. 116— Blackw. 413— Col. Ecplir. i. 124— H. Ox. viii. 18. 1. 
( Stems one to two feet high, branched, leafy, angular, many-flowered,' 
smooth. Leaves unequally winged, leafits roundish, egg-shaped, ser¬ 
rated, smooth, slightly glaucous. Peduncles terminal, elongated, naked. 
FI. Brit. Fertile Jlowers at the top of the spike. Barren Jlowers fewer, 
greenish, sometimes purplish from the protruded stamens : both together 
forming a globose head. Nut quadrangular. E.) The plant has the 
habit of Sanguisorba officinalis , and its fruit also bears a near resem¬ 
blance, but the number and disposition of the stamens, &c. will readily 
distinguish them. 
Burnet. (Welsh: Gwyddlwdn cyffredin. E.) In dry calcareous soil. 
Brathay meadows, near Ambleside, and elsewhere in Furness Fells. Mr. 
Atkinson. Weaver Hills, Staffordshire. Mr. Pitt. St. Vincent’s Bocks, 
near Bristol. Salisbury Plain. (Painswick Hill, Gloucestershire. Mr. O. 
Roberts. In Anglesey. Welsh Bot. About Alresford, Hants, Salisbury. 
Road side between Dunfermline and Saline; and Eildon hills, near 
Montrose. Maughan. Hook. Scot. Abundant on the Flat Holmes, in 
the Bristol Channel. E.) P. April—May.t 
pices, but the herbage more general consists of the gigantic Smyrnium olusatrum, Lavcf 
tern arborea , Hyosciamus niger, and a brush-wood of Ligustrum vulgare. The seeds 
have been strung and worn round the neck as beads, ornamental from their beautiful 
colour, (whence, probably, the specific name), and, in a more credulous age, not without 
reference to certain cabalistic purposes, as a Fuga Dxmonum, and protector from the 
powers of darkness :—“ but it is no marvel!,” saith Gerard, “ that most superstitious and 
wicked ceremonies are found in the bookes of the most ancient authors, for there were 
many things in their time very vainly fained and cogged in for ostentation sake, as by the 
Aegyptians and other counterfeit mates.”—The Daurians are said to boil Peony roots in 
broth ; and to prepare a tea from the bruised seeds, called Dschina. The efficacy of the 
root was likewise pre-eminent among “ Paonice herbcs; ” (Virg. Ovid.) plants celebrated 
for sanatory virtues. E.) 
* (From mrepiov, a cup; or cool tankard, in which this herb is sometimes an ingre¬ 
dient. E.) 
t The leaves and seeds are mildly astringent, and have been recommended in dysenteries and 
hemorrhages. Lewis. The young leaves are sometimes used in salads, and in cool tankards. 
When bruised they smell like cucumber. It has of late years been cultivated, as affording 
food for cattle early in the spring; and growing so luxuriantly, as to allow of three 
mowings during the summer. With. Ed. 1. p. 78. On Salisbury Plain, between Salisbury 
and Everley, this plant forms almost the whole staple of the herbage over a great extent 
of that most excellent sheep-walk. It is kept very close by the large flocks which de¬ 
pasture on it every day, except here and there a flower stem which is left growing. I 
have no doubt but it is a most valuable plant in hard stocked sheep pastures. Cows prefer 
it to clover, but sheep and horses do not. Mr. Pitt. As it only appears in a calcareous 
soil, the failure in its cultivation may have arisen from want of attention to that circum¬ 
stance, and cattle may dislike it when fully grown, though when close bitten it proves so 
