34 



CAESALPINIACEAE. 



VOL. II. 



i. Gymnocladus dioica (L.) Koch. Ken- 

 tucky Coffee-tree. Fig. 2447. 



Guilandina dioica L. Sp. PI. 381. 1753. 

 Gymnocladus canadensis Lam. Encycl. i : 733. 



1783- 

 Gymnocladus dioicus Koch, Dendrol. I : 5. 1869. 



A large forest tree, with rough bark, maxi- 

 mum height about 100, and trunk diameter 

 of 3. Leaves large, bipinnate, petioled ; 

 pinnae 5-9, odd or evenly pinnate; leaflets 

 7-15 (or the lowest pair of pinnae of but a 

 single leaflet), ovate, acute or acuminate at 

 the apex, rounded at the base, glabrous, or 

 pubescent on the veins beneath, ciliate on the 

 margins, i'-3' long; racemes many-flowered, 

 elongated; flowers nearly white, slender- 

 pedicelled, 8"-o/' long; pod s'-io' long, about 

 ii'-if wide, the valves thick and coriaceous. 



Rich woods, southern Ontario and New York 

 to Pennsylvania, Tennessee, South Dakota, Ne- 

 braska and Oklahoma. Wood soft, strong, light 

 reddish-brown ; weight per cubic foot 43 Ibs. The 

 fruit called Coffee-nut. May-June. Kentucky 

 mahogany. Chicot. American coffee-bean. Nickar- 

 tree. 



Family 59. KRAMERIACEAE Dumort. Anal. Fam. 20. 1829. 



KRAMERIA FAMILY. 



Pubescent herbs, or low shrubs, with alternate simple or digitately 3-foliolate 

 leaves, 'and purple or purplish, solitary or racemed, irregular perfect flowers. 

 Peduncles 2-bracted at or above the middle. Stipules wanting. Sepals 4 or 5, 

 usually large, the outer one commonly wider than the others. Petals usually 5, 

 smaller than the sepals, the 3 upper ones long-clawed, often united by their claws, 

 or the middle one of the 3 wanting, the 2 lower ones reduced to suborbicular fleshy 

 glands. Stamens 3 or 4, monadelphous, at least at the base ; anther-sacs opening 

 by a terminal pore. Ovary i -celled, or partly 2-celled ; ovules 2, collateral, anatro- 

 pous, pendulous ; style slender, acute or truncate. Fruit globose, or compressed, 

 spiny, indehiscent, i-seeded. Seed without endosperm; cotyledons fleshy. 



The family consists of only the following genus, with about 20 species, distributed from the 

 southern United States to Chile. It has often been included in the POLYGALACEAE, but its affinity 

 to Cassia and related genera indicates that it should be placed next to the CAESALPINIACEAE. 



i. KRAMERIA Loefl. ; L. Syst. Ed. 10, 899. 1759. 



[In honor of Johann Georg Heinrich Kramer, an Austrian physician of the eighteenth 

 century.] 



Type species : Krameria Ixine L. 



i. Krameria lanceolata Torr. Linear-leaved 



Krameria. Fig. 2448. 

 K. lanceolata Torr. Ann. Lye. N. Y. 2 : 166. 1828. 



A perennial appressed-pubescent herb from a thick 

 woody root, the stems prostrate or ascending, branch- 

 ed, often i long or more. Leaves numerous, linear, 

 linear-lanceolate or linear-oblong, sessile, simple, en- 

 tire, about i' long, "-2" wide, acute, tipped with a 

 minute prickle; peduncles solitary, axillary, i-fiow- 

 ered, sometimes secund, as long as the leaves, or 

 shorter, bearing 2 leaf-like bracts just below the 

 flower; flowers about i' broad, the sepals purple 

 within, pubescent without ; claws of the 3 upper petals 

 united ; stamens 4, monadelphous ; fruit globose, pu- 

 bescent, very spiny, about \' in diameter. 



Florida to Kansas, New Mexico and Mexico. April- 

 June. Referred in our first edition to the Mexican K. 

 secitndiflora DC., which it resembles. 



