CARMINATIVE

(Lat. carmen, a verse or charm.) Medicines which allay flatulency, and pain of the stomach and bowels arising from it., CARNATION., (Lat. carneus, /lesh-coloured.) A favourite florist's plant, obtained by art from the wild Dianthus caryophyllus. Its flowers are deliciously fragrant; and although in the unimproved state they are a uniform deep red, they have been rendered beautifully striped and variegated by succe ive changes in the hands of the gardener. The most succesful cultivators of carnations are the Germans, who po e some hundred varieties, and supply the principal part of the seed used in other parts of Europe. These varieties are arranged in three cla es, ^aAcs, bixarres, and piccotees: the first have ten colours in their flowers, and broad stripes; the second have irregular spots and stripes, and not fewer than three colours; the last are spotted or dotted with scarlet, red, purple, ., upon a white or yellow ground. [s. 210]