708 



TEXTBOOK OF BOTANY 



roses, cherries, and spiraeas. The fruit is variable: it may be akene, 

 pome, drupe, or some compound fleshy structure. 



The rose family is important not only because of its beautiful flowers 

 but on account of its fruits. Apples,^ cherries,^ plums,' peaches,^ straw- 

 berries, blackberries, raspberries, loganberries are much-prized fruits; 

 and their cultivation, preservation, and marketing yield an annual in- 

 come of many millions of dollars in the United States alone. There are 

 about 100 genera and some 1900 species in the family. 



The pea family ( Papilionaceae ) . The members of this family belong 

 to the great group of dicots known as legumes, and are sometimes re- 

 ferred to a single family, the Leguminosae, with about 550 genera and 

 over 12,000 species. The legumes rank second to the grasses as sources 

 of food. They are cosmopolitan in distribution and are represented by 

 such herbs as clovers (Fig. 345), alfalfa, peas, beans, lupine, peanut 



Fig. 345. White clover in bloom. 

 * Apples, hawthorn, mountain ash are often included in the apple family. 

 5 Cherries, plums, peaches, almonds may be likewise separated from the Rosaceae, form- 

 ing the peach family ( Drupaceae ) . 



