[1] Printed by Oporinus and Nicolaus Brylinger. The title is _Rerum
in ecclesia gestarum ... pars prima, in qua primum de rebus per
Angliam et Scotiam gestis atque in primis de horrenda sub Maria nuper
regina persecutione narratio continetur_.
FOXGLOVE, a genus of biennial and perennial plants of the natural order
Scrophulariaceae. The common or purple foxglove, _D. purpurea_, is
common in dry hilly pastures and rocky places and by road-sides in
various parts of Europe; it ranges in Great Britain from Cornwall and
Kent to Orkney, but it does not occur in Shetland or in some of the
eastern counties of England. It flourishes best in siliceous soils, and
is not found in the Jura and Swiss Alps. The characters of the plant are
as follows: stem erect, roundish, downy, leafy below, and from 18 in. to
5 ft. or more in height; leaves alternate, crenate, rugose, ovate or
elliptic oblong, and of a dull green, with the under surface downy and
paler than the upper; radical leaves together with their stalks often a
foot in length; root of numerous, slender, whitish fibres; flowers 1¾-2½
in. long, pendulous, on one side of the stem, purplish crimson, and
hairy and marked with eye-like spots within; segments of calyx ovate,
acute, cleft to the base; corolla bell-shaped with a broadly two-lipped
obtuse mouth, the upper lip entire or obscurely divided; stamens four,
two longer than the other two (_didynamous_); anthers yellow and
bilobed; capsule bivalved, ovate and pointed; and seeds numerous, small,
oblong, pitted and of a pale brown. As Parkinson remarks of the plant,
"It flowreth seldome before July, and the seed is ripe in August"; but
it may occasionally be found in blossom as late as September. Many
varieties of the common foxglove have been raised by cultivation, with
flowers varying in colour from white to deep rose and purple; in the
variety _gloxinioides_ the flowers are almost regular, suggesting those
of the cultivated gloxinia. Other species of foxglove with variously
coloured flowers have been introduced into Britain from the continent of
Europe. The plants may be propagated by unflowered off-sets from the
roots, but being biennials are best raised from seed.
[Illustration: Foxglove (_Digitalis purpurea_), one-third nat. size.
1. Corolla cut open showing the four stamens; rather more than half
nat. size.
2. Unripe fruit cut lengthwise, showing the thick axial placenta
bearing numerous small seeds.