MENTZELIA. LOASACE^E. 239 



larly. (?) Seed large, tinged, ovoid or subglobose, smooth, not 

 margined; hilum linear, acute: cotyledons thick, remaining 

 under ground in germination. Stems elongated and climbing, 

 from large fusiform perennial roots ; leaves cordate, palmately 

 5-7-lobed or angled ; tendrils 2-5-cleft; flowers small, white, 



Iff. Oregana Megarrhirza Oregana Torr. Watson. Stems 10-30 feet 

 long; scabrous or nearly smooth ; leaves cordate or reniform 3-6 inches 

 broad, deeply 5-7 lobed, lobes broad-triangular, abruptly acute, inucron- 

 ate, sterile flowers 10-20 in slender racemes 4-6 in. long, on slender pedi- 

 cels; corolla 3-4 lines broad; fertile flowers without abortive stamens; 

 ovary globose, densely echinate, 2-4-celled, the cells 1-2 ovuled, fruit glo-' 

 bose to oblong, 1-2 in. in diameter covered with stout fleshy spines, 1 -sev- 

 eral-seeded, seeds orbicular 6-10 lines in diameter. In alluvial soil, Oregon 

 and Washington to Idaho and Montana. 



ORDER XL. LOASACE^E. Reichb. Consp. 161. 



Herbs with alternate or opposite leaves without stipules and 

 usually showy flowers, the herbage often clothed with bristly 

 liairs. Sepals united into an equally 5-lobed calyx, persistent. 

 Petals 5 sometimes 10 (the inner series mostly dissimilar) insert- 

 ed in the throat of the calyx. Stamens numerous, rarely few or 

 definite, inserted with the petals, some of the outer filaments 

 often dilated or petaloid and mostly sterile, the others com- 

 monly disposed in fascicles opposite the petals and slightly 

 united. Ovary coherent with the tube of the calyx, 1-celled 

 with mostly 3 parietal placentae; ovules numerous. or sometimes 

 few rarely solitary, styles usually united into' one. Fruit 

 mostly capsular or. succulent, crowned with the ' limb of the 

 calyx. Seeds anatropous, usually with more or less fleshy 

 albumen. 



1 MENTZELIA L. Gen. n. 670. 



Annual or biennial herbs with alternate mostly coarsely 

 toothed or pinnatifid leaves and mostly showy flowers. Calyx- 

 tu^e cylindrical to ovoid or turbinate ; the limb 5-lobed, per- 

 sistent. Petals 5 or 10. Stamens numerous, inserted below the 

 petals on the throat of the calyx and not adnate to them : fila- 

 ments free or in clusters opposite the petals, filiform, or the 

 outer more or less dilated or sometimes petaloid and barren. 

 Ovary truncate at the summit, 1-celled: style 3-cleft, the lobes 

 often twisted : ovules pendulous or horizontal, few to many in 

 one or two rows on the three linear parietal placentae. Capsule 

 ghort-oblong to cylindrical, few to many-seeded, opening by 

 valves or usually irregularly at the truncate apex. Seeds flat or 

 angled. 



1. TRACHYPHYTUM T. & G. Fl. i, 5^3. Seeds pendulous, 

 few to rather many, small, in 1-3 rows, irregularly angled or 

 somewhat cubical, not winged, opaque, minutely tuberculate: 

 flowers in terminal cymes, mostly small : calyx-limb 5-parted : 



