VIOLACE^E. (VIOLET FAMILY.) 41 



shores, from Connecticut and Vermont to Wisconsin and Kentucky. June- 

 Aug. — Flowers small : calyx and filaments purplish : petals yellowish- 

 white. 



Order 14. RESEDACEiE. (Mignonette Family.) 



Herbs, with unsymmetrical 4 - 7-merous small flowers, with a fleshy one- 

 sided hypogynous disk between the petals and the (3-40) stamens, bearing 

 the latter. Calyx not closed in the bud. Pod 3 - 6-lobed, 3 - 6-horned, 1- 

 celled with 3-6 parietal placentae, opening at the top before the seeds (which 

 are as in Order 13) are full grown. — Leaves alternate. Flowers in ter- 

 minal spikes or racemes. — A small and unimportant family, of the Old 

 World, represented by the Mignonette (Reseda odorata) and the Dyer's 

 Weed. 



1. KESEDA, L. Mignonette. Dyer's Rocket 



Petals 4-7, often cleft, unequal. Stamens 12-40, turned to one side. (De- 

 riv. from reseda, to calm or assuage, in allusion to supposed sedative properties.) 



1. R. Luteola, L. (Dyer's Weed or Weld.) Leaves lanceolate; ca- 

 lyx 4-parted ; petals 4, greenish-yellow ; the upper one 3 - 5- cleft, the two lateral 

 3-cleft, the lower one linear and entire ; pods depressed. Ci) — Road-sides in W. 

 New York, &c. — Plant 2° high. Used for dyeing yellow. (Adv. from Eu.) 



Order 15. VIOEACEiE. (Violet Family.) 



Herbs, with a somewhat irregular 1-spurred corolla of 5 petals, 5 hypogy- 

 nous stamens with adnate introrse anthers conniving over the pistil, and a 1- 

 celled 3-valved pod with 3 parietal placentae,. — Sepals 5, persistent. Petals 

 imbricated in the bud. Stamens with their short and broad filaments con- 

 tinued beyond the anther-cells, and often coherent with each other. Style 

 usually club-shaped, with the simple stigma turned to one side and hol- 

 low. Valves of the capsule bearing the several-seeded placentas on their 

 middle. Seeds anatropous, rather large, with a hard seed-coat, and a large 

 and straight embryo nearly as long as the albumen: cotyledons fiat. — 

 Leaves alternate, with stipules. Flowers axillary, nodding. (Roots slight- 

 ly acrid, or emetic.) — Two genera in the Northern United States. 



1. SOLE A, Ging., DC. Green Violet. 



Sepals not prolonged at the base. Petals nearly equal in length, but the low- 

 er one larger and gibbous or saccate at the base, more notched than the others 

 at the apex. Stamens completely united into a sheath enclosing the ovary, and 

 bearing a broad gland on the lower side. Style hooked at the summit. — A 

 homely perennial herb, with stems leafy to the top, and 1-3 small greenish- 

 white flowers in the axils, on short recurved pedicels. (Named in honor of W. 

 Sole, author of an essay on the British Mints.) 



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