FAMILIES OF FLOWEEING PLANTS 199 



out stipules, and showy flowers, which are regular and perfect. The 

 calyx is urn-shaped, 4-6-lobed, persistent and joined with the ovary 

 below or with its angles. The petals, also 4-6 in number, are inserted 

 with the 4-12 stamens on the throat of the calyx. The ovary is 2-many- 

 celled and becomes in fruit a berry or a capsule. 



This family is mainly tropical in its distribution, being especially 

 abundant in Central and South America. Only a single genus (Rhexia) 

 and less than a dozen species are North American. They are perennial 

 herbs, usually 1-2 feet in height, with 3-5-ribbed leaves and handsome 

 terminal purple, whitish or rarely yellow flowers. The^^ delight in 

 meadows and swamps and are known popularly as meadow-beauties or 

 deer-grass. 



In spite of the great number of genera and species the melastoma 

 family is of no particular economic importance. It affords a number of 

 showy greenhouse plants, among them certain tropical species of 

 of Rhexia, species of Miconia, a large tropical American genus of shrubs 

 or trees, cultivated for their large, showj^ strongly veined leaves, and 

 Bertolonia, a genus of dwarf shrubs from Brazil, also grown for their 

 beautiful foliage. 



Family Onagraceae. Evening-primrose Family. They are annual 

 or perennial herbs, rarely shrubs, with alternate or opposite exstipulate 

 leaves, and axillary spikes or racemes of perfect, mostly regular flowers. 

 The calyx-tube is joined to the ovary or prolonged beyond it and usually 

 4-lobed. The petals are 2-9, but usually 4 in number, and inserted with 

 the stamens (the same or twice as many) on the summit of the calyx-tube. 

 The ovary, usually 4-celled, becomes a capsule or nut in fruit. This 

 family includes about 40 genera and 350 species, of wide geographic 

 distribution, but most abundant in America, there being about 30 genera 

 and nearly 250 species in North America north of Mexico. Many of 

 these are weeds of no particular account. Among the most interesting 

 is Epilobiiim, the wallow herbs, which spring up so quickly in ground 

 recently burned over. They bear purple 4-parted flowers. Oenothera, 

 the evening primrose, is a small genus of low herbs with showy, 4-parted 

 yellow flowers. Allied to this are several genera bearing very large, 

 showy, white, pink or j^ellow flowers. Among the plants of this family 

 in cultivation Fuclisia is pre-eminent. It is a genus of 60 or 70 species, 

 the greater part from tropical America, but with 8 or 4 in New Zealand. 

 They are known to us mainly as tender herbs or sub-shrubs, but in their 

 native countries they are shrubs and one. Fuchsia excorticata, of New Zea- 

 land, is a tree 30^0 feet in height. The number of forms in cultivation 

 is very great, but they have apparently been produced by hybridizing a 

 relatively small number of species. 



Family Haloragidaceae. Water-milfoil Family. A small family of 



