G A L I U M cruciatum.
Crofs-wort.
T JET R A N D R I A Monogynia.
G en. C har. Cor. of one petal, flat. Seeds two, round-
ifli.
S pec. C har. Leaves in fours, ovate, hairy. Stem
Ample above, hairy. Bunches of flowers lateral,
with two leaves. Flowers polygamous. Fruit
fmooth.
S vn . Galium Cruciata. Scop. Cam. 100. With. Bot.
Arr. 149.
Valantia Cruciata. Linn. Sp. PI. 1491 . HudJ. FI.
An. 441. Relh. Cant. 377.
Cruciata. Raii Syn. 223.
T his grows every where about hedges and thickets, flowering
early in fummer. The root is perennial, creeping and
{lender. Stems branched at their bafe, but perfectly Ample in
the upper part, weak, and refting againft bufhes, quadrangular,
very hairy, jointed, and bearing at every joint four ovate, entire,
foft, hairy leaves, from whofe bofoms all the way up the
Jem arife feveral flender, forked, many-flowered peduncles,
each furnifhed with two fmall leaves at its flrft divarication.
The flowers are formed exa£tly like thofe of other fpecies of
Galium, except that fome are only male, wanting a germen,
and of the complete or hermaphrodite ones, fome are five-
cleft. The ftyle is deeply cloven, and the rudiments of feeds
two, though one generally proves abortive, and the fruit becomes
globofe, fmooth, and is fheltered by the reflexed leaves.
That this plant belongs to the natural genus of Galium
there can be no doubt: fee the queftion well difcufled in Bot.
Arr. 149 and 1139, &c. but it does not follow that all the
Valantise of Linnseus are of the fame genus. V. glabra, arti-
culata, and Aparine may be fo, but furely V. muralis ought
from its fruit to form a genus. It is to be wifhed that and
other ‘foreign fpecies fhould be well examined as to their
fructification, which appears in fome refpetts to be very curious.
As the old name Cruciata is in fact an adjective, we have
ventured to confider it as fuch, to avoid jarring terminations.
See Remarks on Lathyrus Niflolia, t. 112.