300 PENTANDRIA. MONOGYNIA. Polemonium. 
(Seeds large, angular. Capsules roundish. Flowers soon falling off after 
being exposed to the meridian sun. FI. Brit. E.) Stems in open ground 
short and prostrate, taking a semicircular direction ; but among bushes 
growing to some length unbranched, bearing no flowers. Leaves some¬ 
times heart-shaped. Leaf-stalks long. Woodw. Stems one to two feet 
long. Blossoms few, large, purplish.—At some distance from the sea 
not above half the usual size, but the plant in other respects the same. 
Scottish Scurvy Grass. Sea Bindweed. (Welsh: Cynghafawg arfor; 
Ebolgarn y mor. E.) Sea shore. Norfolk coast, frequent. Mr. Wood¬ 
ward. Walney Isle. Mr. Dalton. (At Bank Hall, and Garston, in the 
neighbourhood of Liverpool. Dr. Bostock and Mr. Shepherd. On the 
coast about Swanage, Poole, and Weymouth. Pulteney. , Near Mary- 
port. Rev. J. Harriman. In drifted sand, Anglesey. Welsh Bot. Sandy 
fields between Troone and Irvine. Mr. M f Nab. Near Ayr. Mr. Mur¬ 
ray. Hook. Scot. Teignmouth. Rev. Pike Jones. E.) Near the sea- 
coast, Cornwall. P. July.* 
POLEMO'NIUM. Bloss. wheel-shaped, with five divisions: 
Filaments broad and membranous at the base: Summit 
trifid: Caps . three-celled, opening at the top: Seeds 
angular. 
P. cfflRu'LEUM. Leaves winged: flowers erect: calyx longer than the 
tube of the blossom : (root fibrous. E.) 
E. Bot. 14— Kniph. 5 — Tourn. 61.1— FI. Dan. 255 -— Dod. 352. 1— Lob. Obs. 
412. 1 —Ger. Em. 1076. 5—Park. 123. 12—J. B. iii. 212. 2—Ger. 918. 5 
■ — Swert. ii. 28. 3. 
{Stem, upright, two feet high, leafy, bearing panicles. FI. Brit. E.) Little 
leaves egg-spear-shaped ; eleven pair or more on each leaf. Blossom 
blue, sometimes white, (large, deeply five-lobed. E.) 
Greek Valerian. Jacob’s-Ladder. (In moist woods and bushy 
roughs, but rare. E.) Malham Cove, Yorkshire. Ray. And at the 
Lover’s Leap, Buxton. Mr. Wood. Near Bake well. Mr. Whately. 
* (Medicinal qualities as of the preceding. E.) The leaves applied externally are said to 
diminish dropsical swellings of the feet. The different species furnish nourishment to the 
Sphinx Convolvuli (Unicorn-moth,) and Phalcena Elpenor. (The proboscis of the former in¬ 
sect is extremely curious, being long and pliant for the purpose of extracting the grateful food, 
honey. It is carried rolled up in contentric circles under the chin, and is capable of being 
extended more than three inches in length. See further illustrative remarks in the “ Won¬ 
ders of the Vegetable Kingdom,” p. 58. The premature decadence of the blossom is not 
peculiar to this species. It affords a no less apposite occasion for reflection, than the more 
usually cited falling petals of the Rose—“ The beautiful evanescent flowers of Convol¬ 
vulus,” observes Wiffen, “ live but for a day, (whence called Belle-de-Jour by the French ; 
E.) opening in the morning and ere sun-set closing for ever. This,onaccount of the profusion 
of buds, is not generally noticed, and numberless successors take off our attention from 
the flower which “ has lived its little day,” and is now no more. How affecting an emblem 
of human life does this simple Convolvulus present to us ! The gay, the young, whose ex¬ 
istence has seemed but a day, are cutoff; and others, equally gay and equally mortal, 
occupy their places ; and the remembrance of them is quickly dissipated by the attractions 
of their successors, who, perhaps, like them, are doomed early to submit to the common 
lot of humanity: 
•-Days on years thus hurry by, 
And of the varying present mar or make 
A gloom or bliss in Man’s eternity.” E.) 
