_Park. Parad. 152. 5. t. 151. f. 4._

[Illustration: No 105]

Under the name of _Spiderwort_, the old Botanists arranged many plants
of very different genera: the name is said to have arisen from the
supposed efficacy of some of these plants, in curing the bite of a kind
of spider, called _Phalangium_; not the _Phalangium_ of
LINNÆUS, which is known to be perfectly harmless: under this
name, PARKINSON minutely describes it; he mentions also, how he
first obtained it.

"This Spiderwort," says our venerable author, "is of late knowledge, and
for it the Christian world is indebted unto that painful, industrious
searcher, John Tradescant, who first received it of a friend that
brought it out of Virginia, and hath imparted hereof, as of many other
things, both to me and others."

TOURNEFORT afterwards gave it the name of _Ephemerum_,
expressive of the short duration of its flowers, which LINNÆUS
changed to _Tradescantia_.

Though a native of Virginia, it bears the severity of our climate
uninjured, and being a beautiful, as well as hardy perennial, is found
in almost every garden.

Though each blossom lasts but a day, it has such a profusion in store,
that it is seldom found without flowers through the whole of the summer.
There are two varieties of it, the one with white the other with pale
purple flowers. The most usual way of propagating it is by parting its