capsule that opens at the summit, usually with 1 or 2 anatropous seeds in each 

 cell. 



About 80 species in 22 genera in both hemispheres, chiefly tropical. 



1. Liquidambar L. 



Considered to be 3 species, one in America and 2 in Asia. Segregated by some 

 authors into a separate family, Altingiaceae. The foliage is highly ornamental in 

 the fall. 



1. Liquidambar Styraciflua L. Sweet-gum, bilsted. Fig. 490. 



Tree to 40 m. tall or more, with grayish-brown furrowed bark and commonly 

 with corky ridges on the branchlets, often exuding a gum said to be pleasant to 

 chew (with which we differ); leaves deciduous, with slender petioles to 12 cm. 

 long, rounded in outline, to 18 cm. long and 12 cm. wide, deeply 5- or 7-lobed 

 to resemble a star, smooth and shining, fragrant when bruised, turning crimson 

 in autumn, truncate to somewhat cordate at base, the triangular lobes acuminate 

 and glandular-serrate; flowers unisexual, apetalous; staminate flowers intermixed 

 with small scales in globose heads that are disposed in terminal racemes; pistillate 

 flowers in slender-peduncled globose heads, consisting of more or less coherent 

 2-celled 2-beaked ovaries subtended by minute scales; styles 2, stigmatic along 

 the inner surface; fruit globose, woody, to 3 cm. in diameter, on peduncles to 5 

 cm. long, the individual capsules opening between the persistent subulate rigid 

 styles and producing 1 or 2 winged seeds, the capsules filled mostly with abortive 

 seeds that resemble sawdust. 



In wet situations and in swampy woods in s.e. Okla. (McCurtain Co.) and e. and 

 s.-cen. (w. to Lee Co.) Tex., Mar.-May; from Fla. to Tex., Mex. and C.A., n. to 

 s. Conn., s.e. N.Y., W.Va., s. O., s. Ind., s. 111. and Okla. 



Fam. 72. Platanaceae Dum. Plane-tree Family 



Trees usually large, monoecious, with wide-spreading branches and mostly 

 exfoliating bark; leaves deciduous, alternate, palmately lobed; petiole dilated 

 and hollow at the base to envelop the axillary bud; stipules membranous, caducous, 

 encircling the twig; flowers densely arranged in long-stemmed unisexual globose 

 heads; calyx and corolla insignificant or sometimes wanting; staminate flowers 

 with numerous subsessile linear 2-celled anthers that are subtended by minute 

 scales, the connective peltate at apex; pistillate flowers with numerous sub- 

 sessile carpels intermixed with scattered linear bracts; ovary tapered above, 

 1 -celled, with a unilateral stigma extending for most of the length of the inner 

 face of the linear-subulate style; fruit indehiscent. surrounded at the base by 

 a tuft of long bristly tawny hairs that are directed upward parallel with and 

 almost encompassing the fruit; seed orthotropous, one in each carpel, linear- 

 fusiform. 



Only one genus of uncertain relationship. 



1. Platanus L. Sycamore. Plane-tree. Buttonwood 



Characters of the family. About 10 species in the North Temperate Zone. 



1. Head of fruit usually solitary; leaves broadly ovate, truncate to rarely cuneate 

 at base, shallowly 3- or 5-lobed; lobes broad, sparsely toothed or 

 entire 1. P. occidentalis. 



1. Heads of fruit racemose; leaves deeply 5- or 7-lobed, deeply cordate to 

 cuneate or truncate at base; lobes elongate, entire to rarely dentate 

 2. P. Wrightii. 



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