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"One of the deadliest poisons of the plant world. And as we don't want any one else to suffer the fate of Socrates, I'll put this away." He looked at the compound leaves, the dried flowers, small, but growing in the characteristic large umbels, and at the cluster of fleshy roots, though now pressed flat, and noted the hollow stems of the plant itself.
Umbellate plants have numerous rays on the umbels of strong stems, but the number is seen to decrease and to become very small on the weakest lateral branches. The same holds good for the number of ray-florets in the flower-heads of the composites, even for the number of stigmas on the ovaries of the poppies, which on weak branches may be reduced to as few as three or four.
The purple fragrant umbels of bloom hung close about me on all sides, each flower, with its five generous horns of plenty, drained over and over again by the eager sipping swarm. But the July sun is one thing to a bee and quite another thing to me.
During the second season the erect, branched, channeled flower stems rise 2 feet or more high, and at their extremities bear umbels of little greenish flowers. The fruits or "seeds" are light brown or gray, convex on one side and flat on the other two, the convex side marked with fine ribs. They retain their germinating power for three years.
This may at once be distinguished by its curly, woolly leaves, and fragrant lilac flowers. It is a desirable species, but suffers from our climate. BUPLEURUM FRUTICOSUM. Hare's Ear. South Europe, 1596. A small-growing, branching shrub, with obovate-lanceolate leaves, and compound umbels of yellowish flowers. It is more curious than beautiful. India, 1857.
From it a rosette of finely pinnated leaves is developed, and later the sparsely leaved, channeled, hollow, branching flower stem which rises from 18 to 30 inches and during early summer bears umbels of little white flowers followed by oblong, pointed, somewhat curved, light brown aromatic fruits the caraway "seeds" of commerce.
COW-PARSLEY. The umbels produce a yellow colour, and the juice of the other parts of the plant a beautiful green. CARTHAMUS tinctorius. SAFFLOWER. The radius of the corolla, prepared with an acid, affords a fine rose-coloured tint. CENTAUREA Cyanus. BLUE-BOTTLE. The juice of the corolla gives out a fine blue colour. COMARUM palustre. MARSH-CINQUEFOIL. The dried root forms a red pigment.
Relying upon this conclusion we infer that all of the three elementary species have umbels, some pedunculate and the others not. On this point they agree with the majority of the allied species in the genus and in other genera, as for instance in Androsace. Hence the conclusion that the common ancestors were perennial plants with a rootstock bearing their flowers in umbels or whorls on scapes.
The time of year had fallen upon rust brown-rust were the bells of the dried heath, the spires of wall-pennywort that lurked in the crannies of the boulders; blood-rust were the wisps of dead sorrel that stood up into the sunlight; fawn-rust were the hemlocks with their spidery umbels, and a deader fawn were the masses of seeded hemp-agrimony, whose once plumy heads were now become mere frothy tufts of down, that blew against Blanche's dress as she passed, and clung there.
As the sun descended towards the horizon the play of light and shade became more marked on the broad undulations of the ground which stretched away, alternately of a pinky green and a violet grey, till they reached the distant fringe of the sky. At the roadside on either hand there were still and ever tall withered thistles and giant fennel with yellow umbels.
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