262 



CLASS MONCECIA. 



the flowers are imperfect, or both stamen and pistil are not found 

 in the same individual flower. The stamens are infertile, and 

 disappear without any fruit; the pistils contain the germ, and 

 when fertilized by the pollen, produce the fruit. 



Class MoncBcia. 



Fig. 123. 



The class Monoecia (one house), 

 contains plants where, upon the same 

 root, we find some flowers containing 

 only stamens, others only pistils. The 

 orders in this class are determined by 

 the number of styles or pistils. 



Monandria. 



In the first order is the Bread-fruit tree ( ATROCARFUS), which 

 grows to the height of forty feet, having fruit of an enormous 

 size, hanging from its boughs like apples ; it is a native of the 

 East Indies, and much valued for food. 



This plant belongs to the third class of Jussieu's method. 



Triandria. 



In the third order we find a very common plant, called cat- 

 tail (TYPHA), this grows in swampy meadows, and in stagnant 

 waters, often to the height of four or five feet. The long, 

 brown and hard spike which grows at the summit of the stem 

 (giving rise from its peculiar appearance to the name Cat- 

 tail), is the catkin; it contains in the upper part, the staminate 

 flowers, having neither calyx nor corolla, the 3 stamens arising 

 from a chaffy or hairy receptacle. The pistillate flowers form- 

 ing the lower part of the spike, produce each a seed supported 

 in a kind of bristle. This plant is sometimes used by the 

 poorer class of people for beds, but is considered by physicians 

 as unhealthful on account of the properties inherent in its 

 substance. 



The sedge or CAREX, is a numerous genus, of which nearly 

 100 species have been discovered in North America. It is a 

 grass-like plant, but separated from the family of grasses, 

 which are mostly of the 3d class, on account of the monoecious 



Class Monoecia, orders Bread-fruit Order Triandria Cat-tail Sedge or 

 Corei. 



