866 BIADELPHIA. DECANDRIA. Medicago. 
M. falca'ta. Flowers in upright bunches: legumes sickle-shaped: 
stem prostrate. 
(2?. Bot. 1016. E.)— FI. Dan. 233— Kniph. 11— Riv. Teir. 84— Falcata 
H. Ox. ii. 16, 7'ow 1. 1, and ii. 15, row 3. 1— Clus. ii. 243. 1— Ger. Em. 
1191. 8— Park. 1114. S—J.B. ii. 383. 2. 
( Root long and woody. Habit like the preceding. Stems hairy. Leaves 
and stipules same as M. saliva; clusters usually shorter and more dense, 
but variable. Flowers pale yellow or violet, frequently green, from a 
combination of these two colours. Legumes black, downy. Seeds from 
four to eight, kidney-shaped, yellowish. The pollen is conveyed to the 
stigma by the curved germen releasing itself with a spring from the 
closed keel of the flower. Sm. E.) 
Yellow Sickle Medick. Butter-jaggs. Balks of cornfields, and 
sandy pastures. Between Watford and Bushy-Hill. Ray. About 
Norwich, plentifully. Mr. Woodward; (and Bury. Sir J. E. Smith. 
Dunwich old Church Yard, profusely; and hedge side from Sudborn to 
Oxford. Rev. G. Crabbe. Willington Ballast Hills, Durham. Mr. 
Winch. Not unfrequent in Cambridgeshire, with purple flowers. Rev. 
R. Relhan. Near Port Eynon, Glamorganshire. Mr. E. Forster, jun. 
Fields at Bradwell and Burgh Castle, Suffolk; also on Yarmouth 
Denes. Mr. Wigg. Dumpton Gap, near Ramsgate, Smith’s Obs. E.) 
P. July.* * 
M. lupuli'na. Spikes oval, upright: seed-vessels kidney-shaped, 
rugged, with one cell and one seed: stems trailing. 
( E . Bot. 971. E.)— FI. Han. 992— Curt. 120— Kniph. 11— Riv. Teir. 8, 
Melilotus minima — H. Ox. ii'. 15, row 4. f. — Fuchs. 819— Trag. 593— J. 
B. ii. 380. 4— Hod. 576. 2— Ger. Em. 1186. 5— Park. 1106. 6—H. Ox. 
ii. 16. 8 —Ger. 1020. 2 —Louie, i. 106. 4. 
Stems , six to 18 inches long, somewhat angular, unless supported by other 
plants, trailing. Branches very numerous, alternate. Stipules oval- 
spear-shaped, with a long awn. Leaves on very short leaf-stalks. Lea- 
Jits three together, oblong-wedge-shaped, serrated upwards, notched at 
the end, with the mid-rib lengthened into a projecting point. Head 
oval. Flowei's small, 30 or 40 together. Calyx slightly downy, nearly as 
long as the blossom; teeth awl-shaped, the two upper ones rather 
shorter. Blossom yellow. Legume turning black when ripe. Woodw.; 
sometimes quite smooth and hairless. 
working condition for twenty weeks, from June to October inclusive, and they prefer it 
to any other kind of food. It should be given cautiously at first, as it then proves a 
powerful diuretic ; and too great abundance will in some horses occasion the staggers. 
Pigs devour it greedily, and cows fatten on it. Dr. Turner, who published a Herbal about 
the year 1550, is the earliest English author who relates the utility of this plant, and his 
information was chiefly derived from the Roman naturalists; though it has been conjectured 
that he first introduced the cultivation of Lucerne, or, as he calls it, Horned Clover , into 
England. E.) 
* In hot, dry, barren, sandy places it is well worth the trouble of sowing for the 
purpose of hay, a practice long since adopted in some parts of Sweden. Cows, horses, 
goats, and sheep eat it. (It is supposed to produce as good fodder as Lucerne, though less 
available to the scythe. Vid. Experiments by Tlios. Le Blanc, Esq. in Martyn’s Mill. 
