732 CATCHWORK. 
CATTERPILLAR. 
is so sticky as to retain hold of any flies which | same plan in one field that he has done in an- 
touch it. 
The English species, Silene anglica, is an an- 
nual weed of hedges, sandy fields, and dry pas- 
tures in Britain. Its stem is hairy, and about 
ten inches high; its leaves are oval and dusky 
green; and its flowers are white, and appear in 
June and July.—The stemless species, S. acaulis, 
is a very small, pretty, perennial-rooted herb of 
the Scottish mountains, growing close to the 
ground, and carrying one kind of it white flow- 
ers, and another kind pink flowers, from June 
_ till August.—The inflated species, S. cnflata, is a 
curious perennial-rooted shrub of the corn-fields 
of Britain, growing about fifteen inches high, and 
carrying white flowers from May till September. 
—The five-wounded species, S. qguinquevulnera, 
is a beautiful annual plant, of the sandy fields of 
England, about fifteen inches high, and having a 
_ blood-coloured bloom.—The conical species, 8. 
_ conica, is an annual, purple-blooming weed, of 
| the same height and habitat as the preceding.— 
The otites species, S. oftées, is a curious, peren- 
nial-rooted weed of gravelly soils in England, 
growing twelve or fifteen inches high, and carry- 
ing cream-coloured flowers in July and August. 
—The sea species, S. maritima, is an interesting 
perennial-rooted native of the sea-shores of Bri- 
tain, about ten inches high, and carrying white 
flowers in August and September.—The sweet- 
william species, S. armeria, is a beautiful pink- 
| flowering annual, but includes also a white-flow- 
ering variety, of the corn-fields of England ; and 
it attains a height of about twenty inches, and 
has long held a prominent place among the cul- 
tivated flowering annuals of the parterre.—The 
nodding species, S. nutans, is an uninteresting, 
two-feet-high, perennial-rooted herb, of calcare- 
ous rocky grounds in England.—The night flow- 
ering species, S. noctiflora, is a curious, pink- 
flowering, two-feet-high annual, of the sandy 
fields of England.—The introduced species most 
commonly cultivated as ornamental plants in 
gardens, are, of annuals, muscipula, hortensis, 
reticulata, clandestina, wespertina, virginica, 
gallica, egyptiaca, and puta; of biennials, bu- 
pleuroides; and of perennials, stellata, catholica, 
nodiflora, tartarica, sibirica, parviflora, reflexa, 
pennsylvanica, regia, fimbriata, polyphylla, val- 
lesia, and chloreefolia. 
CATCHWORK. A kind of irrigated meadow, 
in which one set of channels act both as feeders 
and as drains, or in which a lower set of feeders 
catches the water in its descent from a higher 
set. This is a very imperfect sort of water- 
meadow; and necessarily has great variety of 
alignment in its channels, adapted to the pe- 
culiar irregularities of the ground on which it 
is formed. “To give directions for the forma- 
tion of a catchwork,” says Mr. Stephens, “ is 
beyond the ingenuity of man; for no two 
pieces of land are precisely alike, which renders 
it impossible for the irrigator to follow the 
other.” 
CATECHU. An extract prepared from the 
wood and the green fruit of the J/imosa catechu, 
and of several other trees of the same family, 
which grow in the East Indies, principally in 
Bengal. There are three sorts of catechus. The 
first, Bombay catechu, is in square pieces, of a 
reddish-brown colour, friable, of a uniform tex- 
ture, fracture uneven, of a specific gravity of 
about 1:39. The second, Bengal catechu, is in 
round pieces, of the weight of three or four 
ounces, of a deep chocolate colour internally, and 
resembling iron rust externally, more friable, of 
the specific gravity of 1:28. The third kind, 
catechu in masses, is in irregular pieces of two 
or three ounces, of a reddish-brown colour, shin- 
ing, homogeneous, and wrapped up in large- 
nerved leaves. These three kinds of catechu are 
inodorous, of an astringent taste at first, but, 
soon after, sweet and agreeable; at least, this is 
the case with the first and last sort. Catechu 
is one of the best astringents to be found in the 
materia medica, and likewise one of the most in 
use ; and it is extensively employed in veterinary 
practice as well as in human medicine, but is very 
generally known among farriers under the absurd 
name of Japan earth. 
CATERPILLAR,—botanically Scorpiurus. A 
genus of very curious, hardy, trailing annuals, 
of the hedysarum division of the leguminous 
order. Two species, the smooth-leaved and the 
acute -leaved, were introduced within the last 
thirty-three years, the former from the Archi- 
pelago, and the latter from Corsica; and both 
have a pretty appearance, grow six or eight 
inches high, and carry yellow papilionaceous | 
flowers in June and July. But four other spe- 
cies, the worm-podded, the prickly, the furrowed, 
and the subvillous, were long ago introduced 
from the south of Europe, and grow two feet 
high, and are general favourites in garden cul- 
ture for the remarkable and very curious appear- 
ance of their pods. Their flowers are small, yel- 
low, and papilionaceous, and bloom in June and 
July; and their pods so greatly resemble cater- 
pillars, that a person ignorant of their nature, 
and seeing them from a brief distance, would 
suppose them to be actual caterpillars feeding 
upon the plants. The worm-podded and the 
prickly species, S. vermiculata and S. muricata, 
are the most interesting. 
CATERPILLAR. The larva of a butterfly, a 
moth, or a saw-fly. The names caterpillar, grub, 
and maggot, are popularly used in so indefinite 
and random a manner,’ that, though evidently 
designating three divisions of larvee, they cannot 
without great difficulty, if at all, be so defined as 
not to intrude within one another’s limits. But if 
all larvae be divided into monomorphous and het- 
eromorphous, the former greatly resembling the 
perfect insects, and the latter totally unlike the 
perfect insects ; if the heteromorphous be divided 
