LEUCOJACEAE 319 
4, AGAVE L. Usually monocarpic succulent or fibrous herbs rarely with 
a woody trunk (caudex), the usually large or very large crowded leaves per- 
isting for several years: blade ending in a spine, and usually with horny mar- 
ln teeth sometimes connected by a similar border or fraying away in 
threads as in Yucca. Flowers perfect. Perianth of 3 sepals and 3 nearly 
similar petals, which are partly united, mainly green. Stamens 6: filaments 
elongate: anthers versatile. Ovary inferior, 3-celled, with many ovules: stigma 
slightly 3-lobed. Capsule loeulieidal. Seeds many, thin, flat.—About 150 spe- 
cies, most abundant in tropical America.—MAGUEYS. CENTURY-PLANTS.—Plants 
flower only once, then die, but sometimes produce offsets at the base 
"en DEM minutely prickly or toothed, the prickles or teeth not raised on fleshy 
Leaf-blades narrow (5-10 em.) and long: caudex short or up to 2 m. tall. 
audex one leafless: leaf-blades deeply concave, the 
n with recurved or hooked regularly placed 
pric 1. A. decipiens. 
S permanently leafy : leaf-blades nearly flat, the mar- 
wi w and minute irregular prickles. 2. A. sisalana. 
Leaf-blades br oad "2 0-25 € and long: caudex very short, 
the plants thus acaulesce 3. A. neglecta. 
Leaf-margins prominently ca with gray teeth each of which 
is raised on a fleshy prominence. 4, A. americana. 
1. A. decipiens Baker. Trunk 1-2 m. high: leaves 5-10 x 100-250 cm.; blades 
narrowly lanceolate, deeply concave, onteurving green, each with an abrupt coni- 
cal brown en eh ine il l 
the somewhat repand margins with re- 
s or hooked slender prickles about 
long, and borne 10 mm. apart: 
a 2-3 m. long on a scape of equal 
length, ellipsoid, with us ees 
owers greenish-yellow, fetid, 
: filame 
long nts aa 2 
dle of the tube: eapsule ellipsoid,, 3.5— 
5 lon t flowers often followed 
y abundant bulbils.—(FALSE-SISAL. ) 
group, and it has been suggested that 
they tubo prehistorie rol aC eun from Mexic If this be so, thei 
Mexican ancestors have been lost, or the Florida Bus have greatly bd 
2. A. sisalana Perrine. Nearly trunkless: leaves 10 x 150 em.; blades sword- 
E eee flat, duci slightly glaucous, becoming green and glossy, with 
abrupt con ic gloss y bro end-spine 4—5 x 20-25 mm., the margins typieally 
with few and minute pri ickles: paniele 2 m. long on a seape of equal length, 
ellipsoid, with slender branches: flowers yellowish-green, fetid, 45-60 mm. 
long: filaments inserted about the upper third of the tube: capsule rarely pro- 
duced, but the flowers followed by numerous bulbils.—(S1SAL. SISAL-HEMP.)— 
Hammocks, Dons and eult. grounds, pen. Fla. and the Keys, escaped from 
‘ants originally introduced from Yucatan. First planted in our i on 
Indian Key wher Cun descendants of the original planting still gro One 
of the more MERI fiber-plants. The product is used mainly for sae ne 
twine 
