100 CLASS DECANDRIA. 



rounding the germ, each of them sending out 2 

 bristles. The stamina 12, 6 of them interior, and 3 

 of them sterile, bearing glands. Most of the United 

 States species are dioicous or polygamous, have a 6- 

 parted calyx, and no nectary ; 9 fertile stamens, the 

 anthers mostly 4-celled, the 6 exterior naked ; the 3 

 interior augmented by 6 infertile ones, bearing glands 

 instead of anthers. The berry is 1 -seeded; and in 

 these the leaves are deciduous. The most remarka- 

 ble species of this subgenus (Euosmus) is the Sassa- 

 fras tree, which about April will be found crowded 

 with clustered dioicous flowers, making their appear- 

 ance earlier than the leaves ; the leaves are pubescent 

 beneath, and either quite entire, or divided into 2, or 

 more commonly, 3 lobes ; the berries are purple upon 

 thickish red peduncles. 



The Alligator-Pear (Lauras Persea), of the West 

 Indies, affords a large eatable fruit, with something of 

 the taste of marrow, or of a buyteraceous substance, 

 and is greatly esteemed. From the distilled wood of 

 the Laurus camphora is derived much of the camphor 

 of commerce. The bark of the Laurus cinnamomum 

 is cinnamon ; and the unopened flowers with their 

 footstalks of the L. cassia are the cloves, employed 

 as a spice. No species of the genus extends so far 

 to the north as the Spice-bush (L. benzoin), which 

 may be met with in flower about April in shady and 

 wet places, from Georgia to Canada uninterruptedly. 



DECANDRIA. 



As might be expected from corresponding symme- 

 try, there is a considerable affinity between the 5th 

 and the 10th classes, and also between this and the 

 Papilionaceous plants of Diadelphia. Thus, for 

 example, the Baptisia has exactly the corolla of the 



