THE PKIMBOSE FAMILY. 263 



teristic, as well as distinguishing feature, when they are compared 

 with the Foxglove Family, is the cohesion of the anthers, which lock 

 themselves together, and resemble four tightly-clasped hands. They 

 hold so firmly as to require the knife before thej will separate. The 

 filaments being long, and in two pairs of unequal length, are curved 

 into an elegant double arch, of which the combined anthers form the 

 keystone. (Fig. 153.) Sometimes there are five stamens. The other 

 genera in our hot-houses include Cyrtdndra, Streptociirpus, Gesnera, 

 Trevirana, and ^schynanthus. The ^. albida is a remarkably hand- 

 some plant, having clusters of large crimson blossoms at the extremities 

 of the pendulous branches, from which they bend upwards like Turkish 

 hookahs. 



LXXVI.— THE PRIMROSE FAMILY. Primuldcece. 



Herbaceous plants, seldom more than twelve inches high. Leaves 

 simple, oval, or lanceolate (when under water pinnatifid), often in 

 radical tufts, otherwise opposite, whorled, or alternate, and either 

 serrate or entire. Flowers in umbels, on radical scapes ; or solitary 

 or racemose in the axils of the leaves. Sepals five, combined for 

 nearly their whole length ; petals five, uniform, usually combined for 

 half their length, the upper portion spreading horizontally, or even 

 reflexed ; stamens five, opposite the petals or corolla-lobes, and 

 attached to them ; pistil one ; stigma simple and capitate ; ovary one- 

 celled ; fruit a many-seeded capsule, with a free central placenta, 

 which is often thick and globular. In Centimculus the flowers are 

 tetramerous ; in Trientalis there are seven stamens ; and in Glaux the 

 corolla is absent. The emphatic distinction between the Primulacese 

 and the other families that have regular flowers, with the petals com- 

 bined, and the stamens seated on the corolla, consists in these parts 

 being opposite the petals or corolla-lobes; the stamens of the Phlox 

 Family, the Gentian Family, &c., being alternate with them. The 

 character requires some care in observation, especially where the 

 petals are scarcely united, and the stamens upright in the centre of 

 the flower, as in the genus Lysimachia. 



The pretty and varied plants which constitute the Primrose 

 Family are plentiful in the northern and colder parts of the globe, 

 growing in woods, meadows, pastures, by river and stream-sides, and 

 on mountains, even to the snow-line. Their bright, unassuming, and 



