MANUAL 
OF THE 
NEW ZEALAND’ FLORA, 
Orver I. RANUNCULACEA. 
ANNUAL or perennial herbs, rarely shrubs or woody climbers. 
Leaves all radical or alternate, seldom opposite (Clematis). 
Stipules wanting, or adnate to the petiole. Flowers regular or 
irregular, hermaphrodite or more rarely unisexual. Sepals 3 or 
more, usually 5, deciduous, often petaloid, imbricate (valvate in 
Clematis). Petals the same number as the sepals or more, hypogy- 
nous, free, imbricate, sometimes wanting. Stamens hypogynous, 
usually very numerous; anthers adnate. Carpels generally many, 
free, 1-celled ; ovules one or several, attached to the ventral suture, 
anatropous. Fruit of numerous 1-seeded indehiscent achenes or 
many-seeded follicles, rarely a berry. Seeds small; embryo minute, 
at the base of copious albumen. 
A large order, most abundant in temperate regions ; rare within the tropics. 
Genera 30; species about 550. Most of the species are acrid, and many are 
poisonous, Aconite and Hellebore being familiar examples. All the New Zea- 
land genera are widely distributed in temperate climates. 
Woody climbers with opposite compound leaves. Sepals 
petaloid, valvate. Petals wanting .. rc .. 1. CLEMATIS. 
Minute herbs with radical linear leaves. Petals wanting. 
Carpels with a single pendulous ovule. Achenes in an 
elongated spike Ee of am sc .. 2. Myosurwus. 
Herbs. Sepals deciduous. Petals 3 to many. Carpels 
with a single erect ovule .. : 3. RANUNCULUS. 
Herbs with radical sagittate leaves. Sepals petaloid. 
Petals wanting. Carpels with several ovules .. 4, CALTHA. 
1. CLEMATIS, Linn. 
Climbing undershrubs with slender flexuous branches, rarely 
dwarf and prostrate. Leaves opposite, usually ternately divided 
into 3 stalked leaflets, which are either entire or more often 
variously lobed or cut; petioles often twining. Flowers in few- or 
many -flowered axillary panicles, dicecious in the New Zealand 
species. Sepals 4-8, petaloid, valvate in the bud. Petals wanting. 
1—F I. 
