u s [ 5 3 8 ]
CERASTIUM aquaticum.
W ater Chick-weed.
D E C A N D R I A Pentagynia.
G en. Char. Cal. 5-leaved. Petals cloven. Capf. of
one cell, burfting at the top.
Spec. Char. Leaves heart-fhaped, feffile. Flowers
lateral, folitary. Fruit drooping.
S y n . Ceraftium aquaticum. Linn. Sp. P I. 629. Hudf.
20 2 . With. 4 36 . Relb. 180. Sibth. 14 7 . Curt.
Lond. fa fc . 1. t. 34 .
Affine major repens perennis. R a il Syn. 3 4 7 .
N o t unfrequent in watery places, particularly the margins
of rivers and clear ditches, among reeds and bullies, by which
its weak Hems are fupported, flowering in July.
Root perennial, creeping. Stems 2 feet high, weak, procumbent
unlefs fupported, branched or forked, leafy, round, clothed
all over with prominent glandular hairs; the bark is very brittle,
the woody part tough, elaftic, and tubular, as in Stellaria media
and others of this natural family. Leaves oppofite, heart-
fhaped, pointed, wayed, entire, hairy, feffile, except fome on
the younger or radical ffioots. Flower-ftalks folitary, fingle-
fl owe red, round, hairy, each fpringing laterally between the
leaves, and from the fide of the neighbouring joint of the Item,
rather than from between its branches. Calyx-leaves ovate,
hairy and vifcid. Petals about as long as the calyx, or longer,
deeply cloven, white. Stamina always 10, and flyles as conftant-
ly 5, blunt, hairy on the infide. Capfule ovate, fplitting into
K teeth rather more deeply than in other fpecies of Cerajlium.
Seeds kidney-fhaped, rough, pale brown.
Linnaeus, as we have already obferved p. 92, once confounded
this and the Stellaria media with Stellaria nemorum. In habit,
deep-cut petals, and even the fhape of the capfule, though not
the number of its valves, this is certainly rather a Stellaria than
a Cerajlium; but the 3 flyles are never found to vary. Scopoli
refers fo many Arenarite, Spergula, and Cerajlia to his genus
of Stellaria, that his authority in this cafe is of no weight.