112 £ 1767 ]
PEUCEDANUM officinale.
Sea Sulphur-wort.
PENTANDRIA Digynia.
G e n. Char. Fruit ovate, compressed, striated on both
sides, encompassed with a border. Cal, of 5 teeth,
General Involucrum very short. Flowers of the
disk abortive.
Spec. Char. Leaves five times deeply three-cleft;
leaflets linear, undivided.
Syn. Peucedanum officinale. Linn. Sp. PI. 353. Sm.
FI. Brit. 304. Huds. 116. With. 294. Hull. 60.
Peucedanum. Ran Syn. 206.
O n e of our rarest umbelliferous plants, found in salt marshes
and ditches, chiefly in the south-east quarter of the kingdom.
Our specimen was obligingly communicated by Mr. Crow of
Feversham, who gathered it at Hearn, 6 miles from Whit-
stable, on a cliff by the sea-side, in full flower September 22d
1806, when it was already out of flower by the river side
below Feversham; in which last place it grew in Sherard’s
time, and was also observed by Mr. Lightfoot in 1775.
The whole plant is smooth, and has a strong sulphureous
smell, especially the root, which is perennial, tap-shaped,
very resinous and foetid, and reported to be useful in coughs,
in obstructions of the viscera, and in nervous disorders. Jts
powers, whatever they may be, are certainly of no feeble
kind; but they should be cautiously explored. Stem near a
yard high, erect, round, striated, branched, leafy, tough.
Leaves narrow and rigid, divided 5 or 6 times successively
into 3 deep divisions, the ultimate lobes flatfish, linear, acute,
entire. Umbels large, of a great number of rays, concave.
General involucrum of a few short bristle-shaped leaves; partial
.of several still narrower ones, about half as long as the partial
rays, which are quite capillary, but rigid. Petals yellow,
equal, incurved. Calyx-teeth acute, inflexed. Styles recurved.
Fruit tawny, broad, flat, furrowed on each side.