LEMNA MINOR. LESSER DUCKWEED.
L EMNA minor ; frondibus subovatis compressis, radicibus solitariis.
L EMNA minor. Linn. Sp. P l.p . 1376. L ig h t/. Scot. p. 537. Hu d s.An g l. p. Bot.
A r r . cd. 4. vol. 2. p. 43. Hoffm. Germ. ed. 2. vol. 1. P . I I. p. 187. Willd. Sp. PI.
vol. 4. p. 194. Smith Fl. B r it. p. 957. Engl. Bot. t. 1095. Decand. Fl. Fr. cd. 3. vol. 2.
p . 589. Fl. Gall. Syn. p. 119. Svensk Bot. t. 324. ƒ 1. Alton Hort. K m . ed. 2. vol. 5.
p . 233. Hook. Fl. Scot. P . I ,p . 11. Pers. Syn. PI. vol. Z.p. 532.
H Y D RO PH A C E monorrhiza, foliis planis ovatis. Hall. Helv. n. 1900.
LENS palustris. Ducks’-meat. Raii S yn .p . 129- t. 4. f . 1.
L EN T ICU LA R IA media, et L. minor. Micheli Nov. Gen. p. 16. t. I I . et t. I I I .
Class a n d Order. D IA N D R IA MONOGYNIA.
TNatural Order. AROIDEAL—NAIADES, Juss. Decand.—HYDROCHARIDIBUS AFFINIS* 1 ' Brown.-]
Gen. Char. Pet'ianthium simplex, monophyllum, membranaceum, urceolatum. Fructus, Capsula vel TJtri-
culus, monolocularis.
Gen . Char. Perianth single, monophyllous, membranaceous, urceolate. Fruit, a Capsule or Utricle of 1 cell.
Root : a solitary fibre, calyptrate at the extremity.
Fronds very numerous, collected together, natant, ovate,
more or less approaching to round, a line or
scarcely two lines long, minutely cellular, compressed
on both sides, green, with a Cleft in the
margins at the base, gemmiferous and proliferous,
but not so repeatedly proliferous as in Lemna
trisulca.
Flowers and fruit altogether as in L . trisulca.
Radix : fibra solitaria, ad apicem calyptrata.
Frondes numerosissimce, aggregate, natantes, ovate,
magis minusve rotundate, lineam vix ad duas
lineas longæ, minutim cellulosæ, utrinqüe compressas,
virides, basi marginibus rimosæ, gemmi-
feræ atque proliféras, sed non multoties proliferæ
ut in Lemna trisulca.
Flores fru ctusque omnino ut in L . trisulca.
Fig 1. Plants of Lemna minor, nat. size. Fig. 2, 3. Pro life ro u s a n d gemmiferous plants.^ i% . 4. Gemma.
F ig 5, 6. Flowering plants. F,g. 7. Unexpanded flower. Mg. 8. Unexpended perianth. i t£ . S Jtlower,
of which the peritmth(or spatha) has burst Fig. 10. Under-side of a flower from which the penanth has been
removed Fig. 11. Anther whose cells have lost their pollen. Fig. IS. Grains of pollen. Fig. 13. Pistil.
Fi<r. 14. Ovule. Fig. 15. Calyptra-like extremity of a root—all more or less magnified.
This plant is found abundantly in all ditches and stagnant waters, which it covers with an entire floating mass
of green, and it is familiar to the most common observer under the name of Duckweed, although tew have
seen its flowers. These appear to have been first noticed, about twenty years ago, by Mr. Borrer; but 1 do not
apprehend them to be a t all uncommon, and merely to have been overlooked from their extreme
are seldom to be found where the plants are in the highest state of vegetation; for scarcely have the eas iest flowers
(which generally expand in the month of June) disappeared, than the individuals which produced them verge
towards decay, and sink in a state of fructification to the bottom, where they perish, disseminating the seed, which
becomes a young plant, and, as Valisneri has observed, rises early in the next spring to the surface
I know of on!y two figures of this plant in a flowering state, that in English Botany, and he one to which I
have referred in Srnnsk Bolanisk ; but in neither of them is the fruit represented, though in the latter work theie is
an appearance of two ovules. This idea is, however, quite erroneous : it did not exist m any of the " umf>ous specimens
which I examined, o f which indeed the whole fruit so entirely resembled that of Lemna trisulca that 1 considered
a repetition of the figure and description needless. H H H H
I am aware that the late M. Palisot de Beauvois has published a dissertation on this genus, if I mistake not, it
is in the Journal ie Physique, a work which I do not possess, and which the distance at which I am placed. from
every botanical library hut my own, will not allow me to refer to. All that I can M B B M f f l B “ H i
from the Analyse des Travaux de la Classe des Sciences Mathématiques et Physiques de l In stitut Royal de France
Beauvois a été le premier botaniste assez heureux pour recueillir des graines mûres de Lemna,
6t « l” r&ultedefèteereations de M. de Beauvois, que la fleur du Lemna est hermaphrodite, à envelopped'un«i seule
pièce, à deux étamines qui se développent successivement, à style unique, à ovaire supérieur devenant une capsu e
uniloculaire, se déchirent circulairement à sa base, et contenant d'une à quatre sémences, lesque les germent à la
manière des monocotylédones, mais avec des circonstances fort particulières, dont la plus H B M H M g
parties que l'on peut regarder comme la radicule et la plumule se détachent de la première feuille quelles ont
produite, et la laissent pousser à elle seule des racines et d autres feuilles. f t) •
In thé two species which I have here described, L . trisulca and minor, I do not see any appearance of their
being a “ capsula circumscissa.” - H T , . p ..„r..:
The older botanists attributed medicinal properties to the Duckweeds “ Lenti palustri, says Ray, visn et -
gerans, unde in inflammationibus, podagra et ignibus sacris convemt. Agglutinât etiam in puens
norum. D . Bates quidem pro secreto infallibili ad icterum commumcavit infusionem Lentis palustris in vino aioo.