ASTERIAS.
THE STAR-FISH.
Asterias Triradiata.
Fig. 47. A. triradiata lævis. The smooth three-rayed star-fish.
The colour white, transparent as glass. On all the different shores that have been examined.
Having thus described a few specimens of those pleasing microscopical objects, minute shells, I shall agreeably to the intimation given in the [note] to [page 613], proceed to
A DESCRIPTIVE LIST OF A VARIETY OF VEGETABLE SEEDS.[155]
[155] To the names as given by Dr. Parsons, those adopted by Linnæus are here added.
Lithospermum Officinale.
[Plate XV.] Fig. 1. Ibid. Linn. Gromwell. This seed is in figure exactly like a human heart without the auricles, but has no flat or depressed part on its sides; it is pretty circular round its thickest part, and terminates in a blunt cone. At the thickest extremity there is a circular roughness, which is the umbilicus, and from thence to the cone on the shortest side it is bisulcated longitudinally; so that the space between the sulci is a kind of ridge, nor do either sulci or ridge extend to either extremity of the seed; the rest of the surface is smooth and polished, the ground a light ash-colour, with a shade or cloud of yellow or brown.
These seeds are very hard, and the ash-coloured shell is brittle like that of a hen’s egg; which being broken, appears to be lined with a light olive-coloured uniform membrane, which encloses a nucleus of a Spanish snuff-colour, pretty smooth, and of the same form with its shell, being in close contact with it all round.