134 FOUNDATIONS OF BOTANY 
Il. PTELEA, L. 
Shrubs with smooth and bitter bark. Leaves with 3 leaflets. 
Flowers in terminal cymes, somewhat moncecious. Sepals 
3-6, deciduous, much shorter than the petals. Stamens 4-5, 
longer than the petals and alternate with them. Pistillate 
flowers producing imperfect stamens. Ovary compressed, 
2-celled. Fruit a 2-celled, 2-seeded, broadly winged key.* 
1. P. trifoliata, L. Hopr-rrer, WAarer Asn. A shrub 4-8 ft. 
high. Leaves long-petioled ; leaflets oval or ovate, acute, obscurely 
serrate, the lateral ones oblique. Cymes compound. Flowers 
greenish. Stamens mostly 4, filaments bearded, key about 1 in. in 
diameter ; wing notched, strongly netted-veined. Rocky banks; often 
cultivated.* 
52. POLYGALACEZ. PoLyGaLa FAMILY. 
Herbs or shrubs. Leaves alternate or nearly opposite, 
without stipules, simple. Flowers irregular. Sepals unequal, 
the 2 inner wing-shaped and petal-like. Petals 3-5, hypogy- 
nous, the 2 lateral ones often united with the hooded lower 
one into a tube, split open at the base behind. Stamens 8, 
filaments unitéd into a split sheath, which is usually adnate 
to the petals; anthers usually opening by pores. Ovary 
2-celled, 2-ovuled. [A difficult family for the beginner. ] 
POLYGALA, Tourn. 
Herbs or shrubs. Flowers racemed or spiked, some of them 
often cleistogamous. Petals adnate below to the stamen- 
sheath. Anthers opening by transverse pores. 
1. P. paucifolia, Willd. FrrmGep PoryGara, Basiss’ Toss, 
May Wincs. A low perennial herb, with branches 3-4 in. high 
from a slender, creeping rootstock. Lower leaves scattered, small 
and scale-like, the upper ones with petioles, crowded near the tips of 
the branches, ovate or nearly so. Flowers of two kinds, the cleis- 
togamous whitish, fertile, borne underground along the rootstock, the 
terminal flowers large and showy (nearly an inch long), rose-purple, ~ 
with a beautiful fringed crest. Woods, especially N. and E. 
