CHAP. 37.—PLANTS OF WHICH THERE IS BUT A SINGLE KIND. PLANTS OF WHICH THERE ARE SEVERAL KINDS.
Of ocimum, lapathum, blite, cresses, rocket, orage, coriander, and anise respectively, there is but a single kind, these plants being the same everywhere, and no better in one place than in another. It is the general belief that stolen1089 rue grows the best, while, on the other hand, bees1090 that have been stolen will never thrive. Wild mint, cat-mint, endive, and pennyroyal, will grow even without any cultivation. With reference to the plants of which we have already spoken, or shall have occasion to speak, there are numerous varieties of many of them, parsley more particularly.
(8.) As to the kind of parsley1091 which grows spontaneously in moist localities, it is known by the name of “helioselinum;”1092 it has a single leaf1093 only, and is not rough at the edges. In dry places, we find growing the kind known as “hipposelinum,”1094 consisting of numerous leaves, similar to helioselinum. A third variety is the oreoselinum,1095 with leaves like those of hemlock, and a thin, fine, root, the seed being similar to that of anise, only somewhat smaller.
The differences, again, that are found to exist in cultivated parsley,1096 consist in the comparative density of the leaves, the crispness or smoothness of their edges, and the thinness or thickness of the stem, as the case may be: in some kinds, again, the stem is white, in others purple, and in others mottled.