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P O T A M O G E T O N lucens.
Shining Pond-weed.
T E T R A N D R 1 A Tetragynia.
G e n . C h a r . Cal. none. Petals 4. Style none. Seeds 4,
S p e c . C h a r . Leaves flat, ovato-lanceolate, tapering
down into foot-ftalks. Spike denfe, many-flowered.
S y n . Potamogeton luceps. Linn. Sp. P I. 183. IJudf.
FI. An. 74. IVith. Pot. A rr. 173. Relh. Cant. 71.
Sibth. Ox. 65.
P. aquis immerfum, folio pellucido, lato, oblongo,
acuto. Rail Syn. 148.
F R E Q U E N T in ditches, ponds, lakes or flow-flowing rivers,
chiefly on a clay foil, growing, like moll others of its genus, all
immerfed in the water, except the fpike of flowers, which appears
above the furface about midfummer, or a little after.
The root is perennial, Items long, nearly Ample, a little zigzag,
leafy, round. Leaves alternate (except where the flowers
are fituated) lanceolate or ovate, entire, a little waved, ribbed,
running down into a lhort foot-{talk, and accompanied by a long
obtufe folded intrafoliaceous ftipula, longer than each joint of
the Item. The flowers grow in a long denfe fpike, on a round
tumid ftalk, which Hands folitary in the axilla of one of the
oppofite leaves, and is fheathed at the bottom by the ftipula.
Flowers dark green, the ftigma often purplifh.
There are two common varieties of this fpecies, one of which
has lanceolate leaves, tapering down very gradually to their in-
fertion. This being figured in the Flora Danica, t. 195, and
moll other authors, we have reprefented the other variety,
No. 2 of Withering, whofe leaves are perfectly ovate, and
placed on a real foot-llalk, lefs perceptibly winged by the running
down of the leaf: thefe two plants however differ in no
other refpeft, and may eafily be traced one into the other.