SPURGE FAMILY. 293 



101. SATJRURACEJE, LIZARD'S-TAIL FAMILY. 



A very small family, having a single Eastern North American 

 representative in 



Saururus cermiUS, LIZARD'S-TAIL. Wet swamps: fl. summer ; stem 

 jointed, 2 high, branching; leaves heart-shaped, with converging ribs, peti 

 flowers white, crowded in a dense but slender tail-like spike, with thr mil 

 nodding, perfect, but with neither calyx nor corolla ; stamens 6 or 7, with long 

 slender white filaments ; pistils 3 or 4, slightly united at base. (Lessons, p. 86, 

 fig. 234.) 



102. EUPHORBIACEJE, SPURGE FAMILY. 



Plants with mostly milky acrid juice and monoecious or dioecious 

 flowers, of very various structure ; the ovary and fruit commonly 

 3-celIed and with single or at most a pair of hanging ovules and 

 seeds in each cell. 



1. Ovules and seeds only one in each cell. 



* Flowers both staminate and pistillate really destitute both of calyx and corolla : a 

 Distillate and numerous staminate surrounded by a cup-like involucre which 

 imitates a calyx, so that the whole would be taken for one perfect Jluwer. 



1. EUPHORBIA. , For the structure of the genus, which is recondite, see .Manual, 



and Structural Botany, fig. 1143. These plants may be known, nio-tly, liy 

 having the 3-lobed ovary raised out of the cup, on a curved stalk. 

 short styles each 2-cleft, "making 6 stigmas. Fruit when ripe bursting into 

 the 3 carpels, and each splitting into 2 valves, discharging the seed. What 

 seems to be a stamen with a jointed filament is really a staminate flower, in 

 the axil of a slender bract, consisting of a single stamen on a pedicel, the joint 

 being the junction. 



* * Flowers of both kinds provided with a distinct calyx. 



2. STILLINGIA. Flowers in a terminal spike, naked and staminate above, a few 



fertile flowers at base. Calyx 2 - 3-cleft. Stamens 2, rarely 3. I'od 3-lobed. 

 Stigmas 3, simple. Bracts with a fleshy gland on each side. Leaves alter- 

 nate, stipulate. 



3. ACALYPIIA. Flowers in small clusters disposed in spikes, staminate : ' 



fertile at base; or sometimes the two sorts in separate spikes. Calyx of 

 sterile flowers 4-parted, of fertile 3- 5-parted. Stamens ts-li;. .>.na- 



delplious at base; the 2 cells of the anther long and hanging. Sty 1 

 cut-fringed on the upper face, red. Pod of 3 (rarely 2 or 1) lolies or 

 Fertile flower-clusters embraced by a leaf-like cut-lobed bract. Leaves alter- 

 nate, petioled, with stipules, serrate. 



4. RICINl. S. l'lo\v<-rs in large panicled clusters, the fertile above, the >taminate 



below. Calyx 5-parted. Stamen- very many, in several bundles. Style< 3, 

 united at base, each 2-parted, red. Pod large, 3-lobed, with 3 large si 

 Leaves alternate, with stipules. 



5. JATROPHA. Flowers in cymes or |>:mivle-; the fertile in the main fork*. 



Calyx colored like a corolla', in the sterile flowers mostly salver-shaped and 

 6-lobed, enclosing 10-30 stamens, somewhat monaiielphous in two or more 

 ranks; in the fertile 5-parted. Styles 3, united belov, . .rked 



at the apex. Pod 3-celled, 3-seedcd. Leaves alternate, long-petioleil, with 

 stipules. 



2. Ovules and mostly seeds 2 in each cell of (he oninj <in<l "-hurnt-d /><><!. .Iitice not 

 milky in the following: which Imn us flowers, -1 m/>n!f, l 



sliuntns in lite sterile, and 3 awl-sh<tped spri'it'/hiy or n-fiii-rnl ftyL? or ftiymas 

 in the fertile flowers. 



6. BUXUS. Flowers in small .-eile bract' '- in the axils of the tliiek 



and evergreen entire opposite leaves. Shrubs f tree-. 



7. PACHYSANDRA. Flowers in naked lateral spike-, <ramin:ito ab.ivo, a few 



fertile flowers at ha-e. Filaments long, thieki-h and Hat, white. Nearly 

 herbaceous, low, tufted: leaves barely evergreen, alternate, coaiselj lew- 

 toothed. 



