N. ORD.-EUPHORBIACE&. 447 
GENUS.—EU PHORBIA,* LINN, 
SEX. SYST.—DODECANDRIA TRIGYNIA, 
~EUPHORBIA 
-HYPERICIFOLIA. 
COMMON SPURGE. 
SYN.—EUPHORBIA HYPERICIFOLIA, LINN. 
COM. NAMES.—LARGE SPOTTED SPURGE, BLACK OR MILK PARSLEY 
OR PURSLANE, SPOTTED EYEBRIGHT; (GER.) JOHANNESKRAUT- 
BLATTRIGE WOLFSMILCH. 
A TINCTURE OF THE WHOLE PLANT EUPHORBIA HYPERICIFOLIA, LINN. 
Description.—This inconspicuous annual herb, attains a growth of from 8 to 
18 inches. Sem ascending or erect, smooth or with scattered hairs, divergently 
branching and forking. Leaves ovate-oblong or linear-oblong, sometimes falcate, 
oblique, or slightly cordate at the base, acute, serrate, and short-petioled ; stzpules 
triangular, dentate. Inflorescence in loose, leafy, terminal cymes ; peduncles longer 
than the petioles; flowers numerous. Jnvolucral appendages 4, large and white or 
small and red. Ovary 3-celled, each cell 1-seeded. Fruit a glabrous, obtusely- 
angled pod; seeds blackish, ovate, obtusely 4-angled, wrinkled, and tuberculated ; 
caruncle none. : 
Euphorbia.—This genus consists of herbs or shrubs with a milky juice. Leaves . 
alternate, or in a few cases opposite or scattered, the floral usually verticillate. 
Peduncles terminal, often umbellate-clustered. lowers moncecious, included in a 
cup-shaped, 4- to 5-lobed involucre, resembling a calyx or corolla, and generally 
having large thick glands at its sinuses; glands with or without petaloid margins ; 
sterile flowers numerous, lining the base of the involucre, each from the axil of a 
little bract, and consisting of a single stamen jointed, on a pedicel-like filament ; 
anthers with globular cells; fertile flowers solitary, in the centre of the involicre, — 
soon, however, protruded upon a long stipe, and consisting of a 3-lobed, 3-celled 
ovary with no calyx; styles 3, each 2-cleft; stigmas 6. Fruita compound capsule 
of 3 carpels, each of which splits elastically into 2 valves. Seeds often caruncled, 
and closely invested in a membraneous axil. : : 
Euphorbiacese.—This vast family of mostly tropical plants is represented in 
North-America by 18 genera, 171 species, and 15 varieties, and is characterized te 
* Euphorbus, physician t Juba, king of ‘Mauritania. 
