DIADELPHIA. DECANDRIA. Genista. 829 
G. tincto'ria. Branches scored, cylindrical, upright, without thorns: 
leaves spear-shaped, smooth : legume cylindrical. 
Dicks. H.S.—Fl. Dan. 626—E. Bot. U—Kniph. 6— Fuchs. 808 —Trag. 604 
—Dod. 763. 1 —J. B. i. Z>.391— Ger. 1134. 1— Clus. i. 101. 2—Lob. Obs . 
521. 2, and Ic. ii. 90. 2 — Ger. Em. 1316. 1 —Park. 229. 7. 
Flowers in leafy spikes. Flower-leaves shorter than the blossoms. Calyx 
with five nearly equal clefts. Blossom standard egg-shaped, blunt; wings 
oblong, oval; keel compressed. Summit a little knob. Blossom yellow. 
(Stems one or two feet high. Seeds numerous. Leaves alternate, sessile, 
undivided, spear-shaped, smooth, sometimes having a few hairs at the 
edge and underneath. FI. Brit. E.) 
Dyers’ Green-weed. Wood-waxen. (Welsh: Melynog y waun. E.) 
Pastures and borders of corn-fields. S. July—Aug.* * 
G. pilo'sa. Leaves egg-spear-shaped, blunt, (hairy beneath: E.) 
stem tubercled, prostrate, (without prickles. E.) 
Jacq. Austr. 208 — E. Bot. 208— Kniph. 6—Rose 3. 1 — Clus. i. 103. 2 — Ger* 
Em. 1313. 6— Ger. 1132. 6—J. B. i. 393. 2. 
Stem and branches tough, lying close to the ground, even beneath the moss. 
Stem much branched; the old branches naked, the young ones clothed 
with leaves. Leaves numerous, minute, oval, or oval-spear-shaped, en¬ 
tire, smooth above, with white silky hairs underneath. Flowering - 
branches ascending. Flowers in short terminal spikes. Fruit-stalks 
short, hairy. Calyx hairy, yellowish green; lips nearly equal, pointed. 
Blossom yellow, hairy without, excepting the wings. Legume hairy, 
Woodw. (with few seeds. E.) 
(Hairy Green-weed. E.) Pastures, heaths, dry and hilly places. 
About Lackford, four or five miles from St. Edmund’s Bury, and 
on Soap Rocks, near the Lizard Point. E.) Sir J. Cullum. Heaths 
near Bury, which are perfectly yellow with it when in flower, but 
after flowering it is with difficulty found, the stems lying so close to 
Though the feeblest thing that nature forms, 
A frail and perishing flower art thou ; 
Yet thy race has survived a thousand storms 
That have made the monarch and warrior bow. 
The storied urn may be crumbled to dust, 
And time may the marble bust deface j 
But thou wilt be faithful and firm to thy trust. 
The memorial flower of a princely race.” E.) 
* A yellow colour may be prepared from the flowers, and for wool that is to be dyed 
green with woad, the dyers prefer it to all others. (In the Journal of a Naturalist it is 
said that this plant is seldom eaten by cattle, except in cases of great necessity, 
and remains untouched, if other food be obtainable, giving a deceitful appearance 
of verdure to a naked pasture. The poorer people in certain districts collect it by cart 
loads about the month of July, when the seed of Wood-waxen proves a little harvest to 
them, at which women can gain two shillings per day; but it is considered a laborious 
occupation, the plant being drawn up by the roots, which are strongly interwoven in the 
soil. Vegetable filameuts are very differently constituted from those afforded by animals, 
and are differently disposed to receive colours. The dye that will give a fine colour to the 
one, may be rejected by the other; and this plant is rarely or never used by the dyer for 
cotton articles.” E.) A dram and a half of the powdered seeds is mildly laxative. A 
decoction of the plant is sometimes diuretic, and therefore has proved serviceable in 
dropsical cases. (It is esteemed in Russia as a cure for hydrophobia. E.) Horses, cows, 
goats, and sheep eat it. (Ray asserts that it renders the milk bitter. Apion Genista, 
described in Linn, Tr. x, inhabits this species, E.) 
