SAXIFRAGA, SAXIFRAGE, in botany: A genus of the digynia order, belonging to the decandria class of plants; and in the natural method ranking under the 13th order, Succulenta. The calyx is quinquepartite; the corolla pentapetalous; the capsule birostrate, unicellular, and polyspermous.
There are 38 species; of which the most remarkable are, 1. The granulata, or white saxifrage, which grows naturally in the meadows in many parts of England. The roots of this plant are like grains of corn, of a reddish colour without; from which arise kidney-shaped hairy leaves, standing upon pretty long footstalks. The stalks are thick, a foot high, hairy, and furrowed: these branch out from the bottom, and have a few small leaves like those below, which sit close to the stalk: the flowers terminate the stalk, growing in small clusters; they have five white petals, inclosing ten stamens and the two styles. There is a variety of this with double flowers, which is very ornamental. 2. The pyramidata, with a pyramidal stalk, grows naturally on the mountains of Italy. The leaves are tongue-shaped, gathered into heads, rounded at their points, and have cartilaginous and sawed borders. The stalk rises two feet and a half high, branching out near the ground, forming a natural pyramid to the top. The flowers have five white wedge-shaped petals, and ten stamens, placed circularly the length of the tube, terminated by roundish purple summits. When these plants are strong, they produce very large pyramids of flowers, which make a fine appearance. 3. The punctata, commonly called London pride or none-so pretty, grows naturally on the Alps, and also in great plenty on a mountain of Ireland called Mungerton, in the county of Kerry in that island. The roots of this are perennial; the leaves are oblong, oval, and placed circularly at bottom. They have broad, flat, furrowed foot-stalks, and are deeply crenated at their edges, which are white. The stalk rises a foot high, is of a purple colour, stiff, slender, and hairy. It sends out from the side on the upper part several short foot-stalks, which are terminated by white flowers spotted with red. 4. The oppositifolia, grows natural-
ly on the Alps, Pyrenees, and Helvetian mountains: it is also found pretty plentifully growing upon Ingleborough hill in Yorkshire, Snowdon in Wales, and some other places. It is a perennial plant, with stalks trailing upon the ground, and are seldom more than two inches long, garnished with small oval leaves standing opposite, which lie over one another like the scales of fish: they are of a brown green colour, and have a resemblance of heath. The flowers are produced at the end of the branches, of a deep blue; and thus make a pretty appearance during their continuance, which is great part of March and the beginning of April. All these species are easily propagated by offsets, or by parting their roots.
Hildesheim, Saxe-Lawenburg; the archbishopric of Lubeck; the principalities of Schwerin, Ratzeburg, Blankenburg, Ranzau; the imperial cities of Lubeck, Gotzlar, Muhlhausen, Nordhausen, Hamburg, and Bremen. The dukes of Bremen and Magdeburg are alternately directors and summoning princes; but, ever since the year 1682, the diets which used generally to be held at Brunswick or Lunenburg have been discontinued. Towards the army of the empire, which, by a decree of the empire in 1681, was settled at 40,000 men, this circle was to furnish 1322 horsemen and 2707 foot; and of the 300,000 florins granted to the imperial chest in 1707, its quota was 31,271 florins; both which assessments are the same with those of Upper Saxony, Burgundy, Swabia, and Westphalia. This circle at present nominates only two assessors in the chamber-judicatory of the empire, of one of which the elector of Brunswick-Lunenburg has the nomination, who must be a Lutheran, and is the ninth in rank. The inhabitants of this circle are almost all Lutherans.
The circle of Upper Saxony is bounded by that of Franconia, the Upper Rhine, and Lower Saxony; and also by the Baltic sea, Prussia, Poland, Silesia, Lusatia, and Bohemia. It is of great extent, and contains the following states, viz. the electors of Saxony and Brandenburg, Saxe-Weimar, Saxe-Eisenach, Saxe-Cobourg, Saxe-Gotha, Saxe-Altenburg, Saxe-Quersfurt, the Hither and Farther Pomerania, Camin, Anhalt, Quidlenburg, Gernrode, Walkenried, Schwarzburg, Sonderhausen, Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt, Mansfeld, Stolberg, Barby, the counts of Reussen, and the counts of Schonberg. No diets have been held in this circle since the year 1683. The elector of Saxony has always been the sole summoning prince and director of it. Most of the inhabitants profess the Protestant religion. When the whole empire furnishes 40,000 men, the quota of this circle is 1322 horse and 2707 foot. Of the 300,000 florins granted by the empire in 1707, it contributed only 31,271 florins, 28 kruitzers, being rated no higher than those of Westphalia, Lower Saxony, Swabia, and Burgundy, though it is much larger. Agreeable to a resolution and regulation in 1654, this circle nominates now only two assessors of the chamber-court.
The electorate consists of the duchy of Saxony, the greatest part of the margravate of Meissen, a part of the Vogtland, and the northern half of the landgravate of Thuringia. The Lusatia also, and a part of the country of Hesseberg, belong to it, but are no part of this circle. The soil of the electoral dominions lying in this circle is in general exceeding rich and fruitful, yielding corn, fruits, and pulse in abundance, together with hops, flax, hemp, tobacco, aniseed, wild saffron, wood; and in some places woad, wine, coals, porcelain-clay, terra sigillata, fullers-earth, fine shiver, various sorts of beautiful marble, serpentine stone, and almost all the different species of precious stones. Sulphur also, alum, vitriol, sand, and free stone, salt-springs, amber, turf, cinnabar, quicksilver, antimony, bismuth, arsenic, cobalt, and other minerals, are found in it. This country,