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E R Y S I M U M Barbarea.
Yellow Rocket.
4S
T E T R A D Y N A M I A Siliquoja.
G en. Char. Pod columnar, exadtly' fquare. Cal.
clofed. Stigma blunt.
Spec. Char. Lower leaves lyrate, the terminal lobe
roundifh ; upper ones obovate, dentate.
Syn. Erytimum Barbarea. Linn. Sp. PL 022. Hndf.
286. With. 584. Relh. 250. Sibth. 202.
Eruca lutea, feu Barbarea. Ran Syn. 297.
J? REQUENT every where about hedges, wade ground, and
the banks of rivers, flowering from May to the end of fummer.
Root perennial, tapering. Stem 2 or 3 feet high, Ample or
branched, eredt, ftrong, angular and furrowed, fmooth. Radical
and lower Item-leaves lyrate ; the upper ones gradually
becoming lets divided, and at length obovate ; all are alternate,
of a deep fliining green, ftrongly veined, fmooth, dentate, and
are extended on each fide at the bafe fo as to clafp the Item.
Flowers in terminal corymbi, foon lengthened out into fpikes,
numerous, yellow, the calyx alfo being partly coloured. When
double, they continue long in beauty, and are introduced into
gardens. There are two glands on the outfide of the longer
ftamina, and two under the Ihorter ones. The Pod is quadrangular,
though lefs Iharply fo than in fome other fpecies.
_ The tafte of this herb, though ever fo young, is bitterifh,
flimy, and very naufeous : yet Linnseus, in Flo. Suec. fays it is
ufed as a fpring fallad. What his Variety (3 may be, (the Barbarea
foliis minoribus & frequentius fmuatis of Dillenius in Ray’s
Synopfis,) we.are not certain, neither does Dr. Withering appear
to have feen it. Linnaeus however, in a manufcript note,
fays it is infipid and void of acrimony, and that the leaves are
not lyrate, but the radical ones entire, and cordato-ovate. This
variety therefore can fcarcely be the American Winter Sallad,
or Winter Crefs of the gardens, which taftes pleafantly and
warm like water-crefles, and which we fufpect to have been
generally confounded with Eryfimum Barbarea. Tradition fays
it was introduced a few years ago from America. We have
found it apparently wild in a lane near Leeds, and have been
inclined to add it to the Britilh Flora. It is a true Eryfimum,
having a quadrangular pod, calyx-leaves cohering, much broader
than thofe of Barbarea, from which it alfo eflentially differs in
having all its upper leaves pinnatifid, with oblong, almolt linear,
obtufe and entire fegments, not to mention the wide difference
in flavour.
' ,79$n.lit a. ly/t j?