PEA AND BEAN TRIBE 63 



keel ; stamens 10, their filaments either united into a tube or form- 

 ing two sets of 9 and 1 ; ovary, style, and stigma single ; seed-vessel 

 a 2-valved, sometimes imperfectly jointed pod, or legume ; seeds 

 on the upper seam of the pod-valves. A highly interesting order 

 of plants, containing as many as 6500 species, which vary in size 

 from minute herbs to vast trees with trunks upwards of 80 feet 

 in circumference. In structure, properties, colour of flowers, and 

 range of growth they vary scarcely less than in dimensions ; they 

 are found in all parts of the known world, except St. Helena and 

 another remote island. Many species, under the general name of 

 pulse, afford most nutritious food for example, Peas, Beans, and 

 Lentils ; others supply valuable fodder for cattle, as Clover, Vetches, 

 and Lucerne ; Rosewood, Logwood, and Acacia offer examples of 

 timber ; Gum Arabic, Catechu, Senna, Kino, Liquorice, Balsam of 

 Tolu, and Tamarinds are the products of other species ; Tonka, 

 Bean, and Balsam of Peru are well-known perfumes ; several 

 species of Indigofera afford the valuable article of commerce Indigo ; 

 and in Persia and Bokhara a tree called Camel's Thorn produces 

 abundance of Manna, which in those countries is an important 

 article of food. Other species possess medicinal properties of 

 various kinds ; not a few are poisonous ; and it is worthy of re- 

 mark that some, the seeds of which are eminently nutritious, have 

 properties of an opposite nature residing in other parts of the plant. 

 The roots of the Kidney Bean, for instance, are dangerously nar- 

 cotic. Many plants belonging to the Mimosa group display peculiar 

 irritability in their pinnate leaves. This is particularly the case 

 with M. sensitiva and M . pudica, which are commonly called sen- 

 sitive plants. Almost all the plants of the Order which have com- 

 pound leaves fold them together at night. In some foreign species 

 of Leguminosne the legume loses its characteristic form and assumes 

 the appearance of a drupe, the papilionaceous form of the flower re- 

 maining ; in others the petals lose the papilionaceous arrangement, 

 but the seed-vessel retains the form of a legume. All the British 

 species, however, are decidedly papilionaceous, and the principal 

 varieties of form in the pod are those of the Bird's-foot and others, 

 where it is imperfectly jointed ; and in Medick, where it is often 

 spirally twisted, so as to resemble a snail-shell. The number oi 

 British species amounts to nearly seventy, of which two species of 

 Furze, three of Genista, and one of Broom are shrubs ; the rest 

 are herbaceous. 



1. Ulex (Furze). Calyx of 2 sepals, with 2 minute bracts at the 

 base ; legume swollen, few-seeded, scarcely longer than the calyx. 

 (Name from the Celtic, ec or ac, a prickle.) 



2. Genista (Green- weed). Calyx 2-lipped, the upper lip 

 2-cleft, the lower with 3 teeth ; standard oblong ; style awl- 

 shaped ; legume swollen or flat. (Name from the Celtic, gen, a 



