494 OCTANDRIA. TRIGYNIA. Polygonum. 
(1) Stem herbaceous ; flowers with five stamens. 
P. amphib'ium. Style cloven: spike egg-shaped. 
Var. 1. Aquaticum. Leaves floating, obtuse, very smooth; stamens shorter 
than the blossom. 
(E. Bot. 436. E.)— Kniph. 9; P. Hydropiper — Ludw. 168— Pet. 3. 12. 6 
—Ft. Han. 282— Hod. 582. 1— Park. 1254. 1, a. — H. Ox. v. 29. row 2. 
1— Ger. Em. 821. 2— Park. 1254. 2— H. Ox. v. 29. row 1. 2. f. 4— Ger. 
67 5. 2. 
Leaves of a pleasant green, oblong-spear-shaped, glossy, surrounded at the 
very edge with a reddish line; the younger minutely serrated. Flowers 
red. 
Var. 2. Terrestre. Leers. Stem upright; leaves somewhat pointed, rough; 
stamens about as long as the blossom. 
Curt. 223— Pet. 3. 12. a. 
Leaves darker green. 
In cultivated ground, but very seldom flowering, except in spots where 
water has settled. 
(These varieties seem to depend merely on local circumstances. E.) 
(Amphibious Persicaria or Snakeweed. Narrow-leaved Pond- 
weed. (Welsh: Canwraidd goch. E.) Pools, lakes, marshes, and 
ditches. P. July—Aug.* 
(2) Flowers with six stamens ; capsule of one cell. 
P. hydropi'per. Flowers with cloven pistils; stipulae somewhat 
fringed: leaves spear-shaped, (without spots. E.) 
upon the tree. It is observed in Journ. Nat. that, as in the animal world, after disease 
or violence has extinguished life, the dispersion is accomplished principally by the agency 
of other animals, or animated creatures; so, in the vegetable world, vegetating sub¬ 
stances usually effect the decomposition: for though, in the larger kinds, the high and 
lofty ones of the forest, insects are often the primary agents, yet other minute substances 
are commonly found to accelerate or complete the dissolution. It is probable, that decayed 
vegetable matter is in most cases the source whence this race of plants arises. The primary 
decline is possibly occasioned by putrescence of the sap, or defective circulation, and this 
unhealthy state affording the suitable soil for the germination of the parasitic fungus ; for 
there must be an original though inert seed, till these circumstances vivify its principle. 
Thus do the insidious Byssi , (of which family is the dry rot, B. septic a), with their 
radicles, penetrate like the finest hairs into the substance, and destroy the cohesion of the 
fibres. Some of the genera of plants appear to have distinct agents assigned to them. 
Such is the Sphceria Coryliy (Lamarck), to be found through the winter upon old Hazel 
sticks, (remarkable for the regularity of its tubercles), which originating upon the inner 
bark, at length bursts its way through the outer bark, and there disperses its pulverulent 
seeds. Vid. Journ. Nat. PI. v. f. 3.—However this may be, it is undoubtedly, as described 
by Mirbel, the office of vegetable life to transform dead matter into organised living bodies : 
•—and such is the simple and beautiful circle of nature, ever changing, ever new, (to which 
probably might refer, in an enlarged sense, the “ to ewya wk\os er*,” of the father of 
Physic, rather than, as some have imagined, to the great discovery reserved for our im¬ 
mortal Harvey): and thus, as Dr. Mason Good has well expressed it, “ every thing lives, 
flourishes, and decays; everything dies, but nothing is lost: for the great principle 
of life only changes its form, and the destruction of one generation is the vivification of 
the next.” E.) 
* (Water fowls are said by Curtis to be fond of the seeds. Greville designates the 
plant " a mischievous weed.” E.) 
