£ 6 [ 235 ]
E X A C U M filiforme.
Leajl Gentianella.
T E T R A N D R IA Monogynia.
G en. Char. Cal. in 4 fegments. Cor. falverflhaped,
with an inflated tube. Cap/, with 2 furrows, 2
cells, and many feeds, burfting at the top. Stigma
capitate.
Spec. C har. Leaves feflile. Stem filiform, forked.
Flowers on long footftalks.
Syn. Gentiana filiformis. Linn. Sp. PI. 333. Hudf.
FI. An. 103. With. Bot. Arr. 263. FI. Dan. t. 324.
Ceritaurium paluftre luteum minimum noftras.
Rgii Syn. 286.
n r , -L H IS very uncommon and curious little flower was fent
us by Dr. Pulteney from Dorfetfhire, being found there, as
well as in Cornwall, not very fparingly, in boggy fituations. It
is an annual, and flowers in J uly, ripening its minute feeds in
Auguft.
Root fibrous, fmall and whitifh. Stem from two to four
inches high, ere£t, round, flender, more or lefs branched in a
forked manner, fometimes from the very bottom ; but the lateral
branches have fe'ldom ftrength enough to become again forked,
bearing only a pair of leaves about their middle, where the fub-
divifion would have been. Leaves oppofite, lanceolate, fome-
what fpatulate, entire, fmall, and few in number, chiefly three or
four pair near the root, and one fmaller pair at each fubdivifion
of the ftem. Every part of the herb is fmooth. Flowers
terminal, folitary, Handing on long flower-ftalks, which are in
fa£t elongations of the ftem or branch. Brafileae none.
Calyx ovate, divided half way down into 4 fharp fegments, with
membranous edges. Tube of the corolla about as long as the
calyx, inflated and pellucid; limb yellow, in 4 equal fpreading
concave fegments, expanding only in bright funfhine; orifice
naked, into which the 4 little fhort curved ftamina are ir ferted.
Germen elliptical; ftyle about as long as the germen, flightly
curved; ftigma capitate, fcarcely perceptibly cloven.
That this plant belongs to the genus of Exacum, and not to
Gentiana, there can be no doubt. See Dr. Smith’s leones piB/e
fafe. 3. /. 18, where the characters of Exacum and its allies are
determined. But that genus was not known when Linnteus
deferibed the plant before us, nor had he ftudied the natural
order to which it belongs. •