Brassica juncea, Coss. (Sinapis júncea, Linn.). Chinese Mustard. Figs. 626, 635. Rank and coarse grower, in the common forms making great tufts of root-lvs. if sown early: radical Ivs. usually abundant and often very large, oval or obovate in outline, the blade angled or toothed, tapering into a narrow petiole, which generally bears leafy, appendages; lower st.-lvs. more or less toothed and petiolate, the upper ones oblong or oblong- lanceolate, entire and usually sessile or alternate: flowering sts. and Ivs. more or less lightly glaucous: fls. bright yellow: pod slender, of medium size, tapering into a short seedless beak. Asia.—This species is held by Hooker and Thomson (Journ. Linn. Soc. v. 170) to include a great variety of forms, as Sinapis Iaevigata, Linn.; S. integrifolia, Willd.; S. ramosa. S. rugosa, S. patens, S. cuneifolia, Roxbg.; S. lanceolala, DC., and others. There are two types of it in cult, in our gardens, one with the radical Ivs. somewhat sharply toothed and nearly smooth below (sometimes grown as Brassica [or Sinapis] rugosa), the other with root-lvs. obtusely toothed and spinescent on the veins below (comprising Chinese mustard, Chinese broad-leaved mustard, and brown mustard). Linnaeus founded his Sinapis juncea on a figure in Hermann's Paradisus (Hermann, Paradisus Batavus, t. 230, 1705), which represents a plant very like the former type mentioned above, and which Hermann described as "lettuce-leaved."
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