EUPHOKBIACEAE 123 



Stamens few-many. Ovary 3-celled, with 1 or 2 pendulous ovules in 

 each cell. Styles three. Fruit separating into three, 2-valved carpels. 

 Juice usually milky, 



Staminate and pistillate flowers separate. 



Stellate-pubescent herbs. 1. Croton. 



Stinging pubescent herbs, 3, Tragia, 



Pubescence neither stellate nor stinging. 



Flowers in terminal panicles. 4. RiciNUS. 



Flowers in axils of leafy bracts, 2, AcALYPHA, 



Both kinds of flowers together in a cup-shaped involucre, 

 the whole resembling a single flower. 5, Euphorbia, 



1. CROTON L. Silvery Spurge, 



Herbs with dioecious or monoecious flowers. Calyx in staminate 

 flowers usually 5-parted with rudimentary petals and five or more 

 stamens. Pistillate calyx 5-10-parted, petals usually wanting, and ovary 

 usually 3-celled and 3-seeded. Staminate flowers in spikes, the fertile 

 flowers below. 



Flower monoecious. 



Leaves toothed. 1. C. glandulosus. 

 Leaves entire. 



Flowers woolly -pubescent. 2. C. capitatus. 



Flowers appressed-pubescent. 3. C monanthogynus. 



Floiwers dioecious. 4. C. Texensis. 



1. C. glandulosus L. Glandular hairy annual, 8^-2° high : leaves 

 oblong-ovate, bearing two glands at base : staminate flowers with four 

 sepals, four petals, a four-rayed disk and eight stamens: fertile flowers 

 with five sepals, and rudimentary petals. — Adventized at Sheifield and 

 Courtney. Native in sandy soil near Argentine, Kansas. .Tuly-October. 



2. C. capitatus Michx. Densely stellate-pubescent annual, l°-3° 

 high : leaves lanceolate-oblong, cordate at base : sterile flowers with five 

 sepals, five petals and 10-14 stamens : fertile flowers with 6-8 sepals and 

 no petals : capsules erect. — Often abundant on dry prairies, especially in 

 the southern part. July-October. 



3. C. monanthogynus Michx. Silvery pubescent annual, 6^-2° 

 high : leaves ovate-oblong : sterile flowers with 3-5 sepals, petals and 

 scale-like glands, and 3-8 stamens : fertile flowers with five sepals, no 

 petals, and five glands : capsules on recurved peduncles. — Common in 

 dry grounds throughout. July-October. 



4. C. Texensis (Klotzech.) Muell. Arg. Stellate-pubescent annual, 

 l°-2° high : leaves linear-oblong : both sterile and pistillate flowers with 

 five sepals, no petals and 5 small glands : stamens ten. Found occasion- 

 ally as a waif near Shefiield, Courtney and Independence, July-October, 



2. ACALYPHA L, Three-seeded Mercury, 

 Herbs with monoecious flowers, the sterile in spikes, the fertile at their 

 base, surrounded by a leafy bract. Sterile flowers composed of a 4-parted 



