252 ARALIACEAE. 



less deeply 4-grooved, with or without minute lobes; 

 ovary 2-4-celled; ovules 1 in each cell, pendulous; styles 

 4, short, often plumose. Fruit splitting at maturity 

 into 4 bony, 1-seeded, indehiscent carpels. 



1. M. spicatum L, Submerged leaves in whorls of 4's and 5's, 

 dissected into capillary divisions; floral leaves ovate, entire or 

 serrate, usually shorter than the flowers or sometimes none; spike 

 2.5-7.5 cm, long; petals 4, deciduous; stamens 8; fruit about 2 mm. 

 long and 3 mm. thick; carpels rounded on the back, with a deep 

 groove between them, smooth or rarely slightly rugose. 



Occasional in deep pools or lakes in all the mountains. 



Family 74. ARALIACEAE. Ginseng Family. 

 Herbs, shrubs or trees, with alternate or verticillate 

 rarely opposite leaves, and perfect or polygamous, vari- 

 ously clustered flowers. Calyx-tube adnate to the ovary, 

 its limb truncate or toothed. Petals usually 5, valvate or 

 slightly imbricate, sometimes cohering together, inserted 

 on the margin of the calyx. Stamens as many as the 

 petals and alternate with them, rarely none, inserted on 

 the epigynous disk; filaments filiform or short; anthers 

 introrse. Ovary inferior, 1-several-celled ; styles as 

 many; ovules 1 in each cell, pendulous, anatropous. 

 Fruit a berry or drupe. Seeds flattened or somewhat 

 3-angled; the testa thin; endosperm copious; embryo 

 small. 



1. ARALIA L. 



Perennial herbs or shrubs, with alternate digitate or 

 compound leaves, and small flowers in a mostly simple 

 umbel, these either solitary, racemed or panicled. Pedi- 

 cels jointed. Bracts small. Calyx 5-toothed or entire. 

 Petals 5, ovate, slightly imbricate. Stamens 5. Disk 

 depressed or rarely conical. Ovary 2-5-celled; styles 

 free or united at base, becoming divaricate; stigmas ter- 

 minal. Fruit laterally compressed, becoming 3-5-angled, 

 fleshy externally; endocarp chartaceous. 



1. A. calif omica Wats. (California Spikenard.) Herba- 

 ceous, unarmed and nearly glabrous, stout, 2-4 m. high, from a 

 large thick root; leaves bipinnate or the upper pinnate, with 1-2 

 pairs of leaflets, these cordate-ovate, 10-20 cm. long or more, 



