460 AIZOACEAE 



AIZOACEAE. CARPET-WEED FAMILY. 



Ours prostrate or decumbent herbs. Flowers perfect and regular, either 

 solitary or clustered. Calyx 4 or 5-lobed or -parted, either free from or more 

 or less adnate to the ovary. Stamens hypogynous or commonly perigynous, 

 fewer than the sepals or more numerous. Fruit a loculicidal or circumscissile 

 capsule or indehiscent. Species 450 in 18 genera, mostly African but occurring 

 in all continents. Plants of widely divergent aspect and flower structure. 

 Oalyx free from the ovary; petals none; leaves opposite. 

 Capsule loculicidal, 3-valved ; sepals 5 ; ovary 3-celled. 



Stamens 3 to 5 ; herbage glabrous 1. MOLLUGO. 



Stamens 5 to 10; herbage soft-pubescent 2. GLIXUS. 



Capsule circumseissile ; calyx 5-cleft. 



Stipules scarious, laciniate; ovary 1-celled; stamens 1 to 3 3. CYPSELEA. 



Stipules none ; ovary 2 to 5-celled ; stamens numerous 4. SESUVIUM. 



Calyx-tube adnate to the ovary, the flattish summit of the latter free. 



Petals none; leaves alternate, plane; fruit indehiscent 5. TETRAGONIA. 



Petals numerous; leaves opposite, 3-sided and very fleshy; fruit dehiscent 



6. MESEMBRYANTHEMUM. 

 1. MOLLUGO L. CARPET-WEED. 



Low glabrous much-branched annuals with whorled leaves and obsolete stip- 

 ules. Flowers axillary, on slender pedicels. Sepals 5, scarious-margined, white 

 within, thus resembling petals when expanded, persistent. Petals none. Sta- 

 mens 5, hypogynous and alternate with the sepals, or 3 and alternate with 

 the cells of the ovary. Stigmas 3. Capsule 3-celled, 3-valved, loculicidally 

 dehiscent, the partitions breaking away from the many-seeded axis. All con- 

 tinents, chiefly Old World tropics, 13 species. (Ancient Latin name for some 

 soft plant.) 



1. M. verticillata L. INDIAN CHICKWEED. Stems prostrate, slender, many 

 from the base, 3 to 7 inches long, forming patches, not fleshy; leaves 5 or 

 6 in a whorl, unequal, oblanceolate, or spatulate, entire, 4 to 8 lines long; 

 flowers several at each node ; sepals oblong, 1 line long ; capsule ovoid, scarcely 

 exserted from the calyx; seeds reniform, shining, nearly smooth, obviously 

 striate, crowded in the capsule and irregularly distending its half -transparent 

 walls, which are thus roughened. 



Native of the Old World tropics; introduced into California by way of 

 Mexico; sparingly naturalized. 



Locs. Eagle Creek Canon, Modoc Co., Brewer in 1862; Stillwater (Shasta Co.), M. S. Baker 

 in 1898; Princeton, Chandler in 1905; Healdsburg, Alice King in 1897; Kussian Eiver, Davy 

 in 1896; Visalia ace. Coville; Los Angeles, Davidson in 1893. 



Ref. MOLLUGO VERTICILLATA L. Sp. PI. 89 (1753), "Africa, Virginia." 



2. GLINUS L. 



Annual herbs with whorled petioled leaves; very near Mollugo. Flowers 

 pedicelled in dense glomerules in the upper axils. Stamens 5 to 10 or 20. 

 Seeds with a strophiole, the funiculus very long and slender. Species about 

 5, tropics and subtropics. (Greek name of Theophrastus for a maple, appli- 

 cation to this gnus unknown. ) 



1. G. lotoides Loefl. Diffusely branched from the base, the stems 4 to 8 

 inches long, procumbent or ascending; leaves orbicular to obovate, rounded 

 at apex or abruptly acute, 3 to 6 lines long, at base narrowed to a slender 

 petiole; flowers 2 lines long; stamens 5; seeds blackish, granulated. 



Introduced into California from Europe, but only slightly established. 



Locs. Lathrop, K. Brandegee ; Chico, Parry; Lakeport (Zoe, 4: 153). 



Eef. GLIXUS LOTOIDES Loefl. Iter Hispan. 145 (1758), type loc. Spain. 



3. CYPSELEA Turp. 



Inconspicuous prostrate annual. Leaves opposite, those of each pair un- 

 equal, and with scarious laciniate stipules. Tube of calyx short, campanulate, 



