EXOGENOUS OR DICOTYEEPOXOUS PLANTS. 



391 



cultivation, for their beauty or fragrance ; such as the TVall-flower, 

 Stock, &c. 



754. Ord. CapparidaceBB {Caper Family). Herbs, or in the tropics 

 often shrubs or trees ; differing from Cruciferaj in the one-celled pod 

 (which is often stalked) being destitute of any false partition ; in the 

 kidney-shaped seeds ; and in the stamens, Avhich, when six, are 

 scarcely tetradynamous, and are often more numerous. — Ex. Cle- 

 ome, Polanisia, Gynandropsis ; chiefly tropical or subtropical. 

 Many have the pungency of Cruciferse, but are more acrid. Capers 

 are the pickled flower-buds of Capparis spinosa of the Levant, &c. 

 The roots and herbage or bark are bitter, nauseous, and sometimes 

 poisonous. 



710 709 





706 



707 



708 



755. Ord. RescdaCCfC {Mignonette Family). Herbs, with a watery 

 juice, and alternate leaves without stipules, except a pair of glands 

 be so considered : the flowers in terminal racemes, small, and often 

 fragrant. — Calyx persistent, of four to seven sepals, somewhat 

 united at the base. Corolla of two to seven usually unequal and 

 lacerated petals, with broad or thickened claws (Fig. 377). A 

 fleshy disk is commonly present, enlarged posteriorly between the 

 petals and the stamens, and bearing the latter, which vary from 

 three to forty in number, and are not covered by the jietals and 

 sepals in the bud. Fruit a one-celled pod, with three to six parietal 

 placentte, tlii-ee to six-lobed at the apex, where it opens along the 



FIG. 706. Flower of Gynandropsis. 707. Flower of Polanisia graveolens 708. Fructified 

 OTary of the same, a portion cut away by a vertical and horizontal section, to show the single 

 cell and two parietal placentse. 709. Cross-section of the ovary. 710. Section of the seed and 

 fmbryo. 



