ARALIACE^. 177 



The fruits are more than those of a Slum than of a Heracleum. They 

 mature late and cannot be found 'ripe before September. The foliage 

 reminds one of that of the Wood Sanicle (Sanicula europaea). 



ARALIACE/E. 



(HEPTAPLEURUM and BRASSAIA.) 



Shrubs and trees with digitately compound leaves 

 on stalks with broad sheathing bases. Flowers small, 

 woody, in spikes umbels or heads, which are again in 

 racemes. Calyx more or less enclosing the ovary and 

 surmounted by five or six small teeth. Petals woody, 

 valvate. Stamens as many. Ovary inferior or half 

 inferior : cells five or six with one seed hanging from 

 the top with micropyle facing upwards and outwards. 

 Fruit fleshy or leathery with a few seeds. 



Species about 400 mostly tropical. 



Many of the family have a peculiar smell when crushed and are poison- 

 ous (e.g., Ivy). Species of aralia and I'ANAX are well-known garden 

 foliage plants, showing under cultivation great variation in the cutting of 

 the leaves. The family is allied to the uaibellifer.-e and might be 

 considered its tropical representative, but with its peculiar characteristics 

 much less fully developed. In Europe there is only the very common 

 Ivy., Ger. Epheu, Fr. Lierre. 



Flowers in spikes or umbels, racemed . . . heptapleurum. 

 Flowers in heads, racemed . brassaia. 



HEPTAPLEURUM. f.b.i. 71 vii. 



Large shrubs or trees, sometimes straggling, glabrous 

 and without prickles. Leaves alternate, crowded near 

 the ends of the branches : stalk with broad sheathing 

 base extended up above the insertion (or stipules adnate 

 to it and joined together above as in the POLYGONACE^E) : 

 leaflets five to seven, stalked, entire or nearly so. Calyx- 

 teeth obsolete. Petals five to six or more, valvate. 

 Stamens as many. Ovary more or less inferior and 

 surmounted by a honey-secreting disc fully developed or 



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