i.e._, on erect stems,
with leaves long heart-shape, and its later flowers without petals--not a
word said of its earlier flowers which have got those unimportant
appendages! In the plate of the Flora it is a very perfect transitional
form between violet and pansy, with beautifully firm and well-curved
leaves, but the colour of blossom very pale. "In subalpinis Norvegiae
passim," all that we are told of it, means I suppose, in the lower Alpine
pastures of Norway; in the Flora Suecica, p. 306, habitat in Lapponica,
juxta Alpes.
38. VI. VIOLA MIRABILIS. Flora Danica, 1045. A small and exquisitely formed
flower in the balanced cinquefoil intermediate between violet and pansy,
but with large and superbly curved and pointed leaves. It is a mountain
violet, but belonging rather to the mountain woods than meadows. "In
sylvaticis in Toten, Norvegiae."
Loudon, 3056, "Broad-leaved: Germany."
Linnaeus, Flora Suecica, 789, says that the flowers of it which have perfect
corolla and full scent often bear no seed, but that the later 'cauline'
blossoms, without petals, are fertile. "Caulini vero apetali fertiles sunt,
et seriores. Habitat passim Upsaliae."
I find this, and a plurality of other species, indicated by Linnaeus as
having triangular stalks, "caule triquetro," meaning, I suppose, the kind
sketched in Figure 1 above.
39. VII. VIOLA ARVENSIS. Field Violet. Flora Danica, 1748. A coarse running
weed; nearly like Viola Cornuta, but feebly lilac and yellow in colour. In
dry fields, and with corn.
Flora Suecica, 791; under titles of Viola 'tricolor' and 'bicolor
arvensis,' and Herba Trinitatis. Habitat ubique in _sterilibus_ arvis:
"Planta vix datur in qua evidentius perspicitur generationis opus, quam in
hujus cavo apertoque stigmate."
It is quite undeterminable, among present botanical instructors, how far
this plant is only a rampant and over-indulged condition of the true pansy
(Viola Psyche); but my own scholars are to remember that the true pansy is
full purple and blue with golden centre; and that the disorderly field
varieties of it, if indeed not scientifically distinguishable, are entirely
separate from the wild flower by their scattered form and faded or altered
colour. I follow the Flora Danica in giving them as a distinct species.
40. VIII. VIOLA PALUSTRIS. Marsh Violet. Flora Danica, 83. As there drawn,
the most finished and delicate in form of all the violet tribe; warm white,
streaked with red; and
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