Pimpernel

Pimpernel (from the Keltic pimper, "five"), the popular name for several little creeping plants with five-pointed corollas, especially Anagallis arvensis, the scarlet pimpernel, or poor man's weather-glass, A. ccerulea, the blue, A. tenella, the bog, and Lysimachia nemorum, the yellow or wood pimpernel, all members of the primrose family. The genus Anagallis has capsular fruits which, with those of a few other plants, split transversely when ripe. A. arvensis is a weed in cultivated ground. Its petals close in wet, cloudy, or threatening weather. A. tenella, with pale pink funnel-shaped flowers, grows in peaty bogs.