350 THE CROWFOOT FAMILY 
of marsh-marigold are inserted upon the torus below the 
ovaries, or that their insertion is hypogynous.1 This implies 
that the gyncecium is inserted wholly above the other organs 
of the flower, or, in a word, that the ovaries are superior. 
Superior ovaries are found in nearly all of the crowfoot 
family. The torus is usually either convex (Fig. 290), 
conical (Fig. 293), or much elongated (Fig. 285). Peonies, on 
the contrary (Fig. 282), have the torus slightly concave so that 
it forms a shallow cup at the bottom of which the pistils are 
inserted, while around its rim are borne the stamens, petals, 
and sepals. Such insertion of the androecium and floral 
envelopes makes them perigynous? and the ovaries half- 
inferior. Wholly inferior ovaries occur as we shall see in 
other families but not in this. 
Throughout the family the floral organs are free, that is 
to say each set is inserted on the torus independently and 
develops unconnected with other sets. Furthermore, with 
few exceptions, the organs of each set are distinct, that is, 
unconnected with one another. The chief exceptions are in 
certain species related to the Christmas rose and in fennel- 
flowers where, as we have seen, the carpels have grown up 
joined together or are somewhat coalescent? as botanists 
say when the parts united are of the same sort. 
Another feature exhibited in general by the flowers of this 
family is the alternation of the parts, by which we mean that 
the members of one whorl or rosette stand in front of the 
spaces between the members of the next whorl or rosette, 
when of the same number. This is well shown in the floral 
diagrams, Figs. 178, 282, 284, 286, 287, 288, 290, 293. At first 
sight, this may not seem to be true of the stamens and stami- 
nodes of columbines and monkshoods but the alternation 
will be apparent when it is remembered that the parts are in 
whorls of five. 
The fruit of a flowering plant is understood to include the 
seeds and whatever parts ripen with them. The ripened 
1 Hy-pog’y-nous < Gr. hypo, beneath; gyne, pistil. 
2 Pe-rig’-y-nous < Gr. peri, around. 
3 Co-al-es’-cent < co, together; alescere, to grow up. 
