Spec Plant Willd. i. 54.

Cl. 2. Ord. 1. Diandria Monogynia. Nat. ord. Veroniceae.

G. 44. Corolla border four-cleft, with the lowest segment narrower. Capsule two-celled.

* * with corymbose racemes.

Species 30. V. Beccabunga.1 Broad-leaved Brooklime. Med. Bot. 3d edit. 363. t. 132. Eng. Bot. x. 655. Smith, Flora Brit. i. 20.

Officinal. Beccabunga; herba, Dub. The herbaceous part of Brooklime.

Syn. Beccabunga; Veronique aquatique (F.), Bachbunge(G.), Beckeboom (Dutch), Bekkebunge (Dan.), Backabunga (Swed.), Potoeznik (Polish), Ana-galide acquatica (I), Beccabunga (S., Port.), Ibunka (Russ.).

Beccabunga is an indigenous, perennial plant, common in rivulets and clear ditches, flowering in July and August. The stem, which is procumbent or floating, and gives off from the joints long, simple, fibrous roots, is round, leafy, and, like every other part of the plant, smooth and shining. The leaves are opposite in pairs, on short petioles, oval, serrated, somewhat fleshy, punctured, and of a pale green colour. The flowers are collected in opposite axillary clusters, and individually supported on delicate foot-stalks, accompanied by linear-lanceolate bractes: the calyx is divided into four acute segments, shorter than the corolla, which is of a very beautiful sky-blue colour, with the tube white: the anthers are whitish, supported on filaments longer than the style; and the capsule cloven, almost twin. This plant is green throughout the year, but in greatest perfection in the spring.

Qualities. - It is inodorous, and has, when much chewed, a bitterish, slightly astringent taste. The expressed juice reddens the more delicate vegetable blues in a small degree.

Medical properties and uses. - Although brooklime was formerly considered as a good antiscorbutic, yet it is properly disregarded by modern practitioners; and, as Lewis observes, if it be expected to produce any good effect, it should be used as food.

1 The specific appellation is probably derived from the Flemish beck-pungen, mouth-smart. In Scotland, where it is often eaten like water-cresses, it is called water-purpie.