Order 94. Amarantacece . 26$ 



f unnel-shaped, of female flower tabular, stamens 6 to 10, ovary oblique 

 sessile. * P. aculeata, woody, often climbing, prickly, leaves elliptic 

 obtuse, flowers small, greenish white in panicles, fruit oblong or 

 club-shaped, ribbed and glandular. Not in D. S. Konkan and else- 

 where (G. and if.). 



P. alba, a native of the Andamans, where it grows to be a tree 30 

 or 40 feet high, is the lettuce plant or tree lettuce, common in tubs 

 in Bombay, and owing its name to its light green leaves, which D. 

 says grow darker away from the light, contrary to the usual rule. 

 Chinai Sdlib. 



The next two orders contain very many of the plants which are 

 used as potherbs, or bhdji. 



ORDER 94. AMARANTACE^l. 



Herbs, rarely slirubs, leaves without stipules simple, flowers 

 usually in terminal spikes with chaffy bracts and bracteoles, 

 sepals rigid or dry, generally 5, sometimes 2 or 3, separate or 

 slightly connected, persistent, stamens 1 to 5, styles 1 to 3, 

 fruit dry, generally one-seeded. 



This is an uninteresting order though useful for food. It is closely 

 allied to the next, but distinguished from it by the dry bracts, which 

 are often more conspicuous than the sepals. 



Note. The anthers are 2-celled in all the Indian genera except 

 Alternanthera and Gomphrena. 



(,) Leaves alternate. 



1. CELOSIA. Flowers white or pink shining, sepals chaffy, 

 stamens 5 united below into a cup, fruit circumsciss. 



2. DIGEEA. Flowers in threes, the two outer reduced to 

 crested scales, stamens 5, ovary oblong, truncate. Style fili- 

 form, stigmas 2 curved back, fruit a roundish nut. 



3. AMARATSTHDS. Flowers small unisexual, ovary com- 

 pressed, style short or none, stigmas 2 or 3, fruit compressed. 



(&.) Leaves opposite (except Nos. 5 and 6 partially). 



4. PUPALIA. Perfect flowers few, surrounded by imperfect 

 ones, which are reduced to bristly hooked awns, stamens 5, 

 fruit compressed. 



5. NOTHOSJ]RUA. Branched from the base, flowers most 

 minute, woolly, sepals colourless 3 to 5, stamens 1 or 2. 



6. ^ERUA. Woolly herbs or undershrubs, leaves sometimes 

 alternate, flowers very small, sometimes polygamous, sepals and 

 stamens 4 or 5, the latter united below with staminodes into a 

 cup. 



7. ACHYBANTHES. Flowers in spikes, bracts spinous, sepals 

 4 or 5 shining, becoming hard and ribbed, stamens 2 to 5, 

 united at the base to as many square staminodes. 



