602 MISCELLANEOUS VEGETABLES. 



MARTYNIA. 



Unicorn Plant. Gray. Martynia proboscidea. 

 A hardy, annual plant, with a strong, branching stem two 

 feet and a half or three feet high. The leaves are large, 

 heart-shaped, entire or undulated, downy, viscous, and of a 

 peculiar musk-like odor when bruised or roughly handled ; 

 the flowers are large, bell-shaped, somewhat two-lipped, dull 

 white, tinged or spotted with yellow and purple, and pro- 

 duced in long, leafless racemes, or clusters ; the seed-pods 



The Martynia. 



are green, very downy or hairy, fleshy, oval, an inch and a 

 half in their greatest diameter, and taper to a long, compar- 

 atively slender, incurved horn, or beak. The fleshy, succu- 

 lent character of the pods is of short duration ; they soon 

 become fibrous, the elongated beak splits at the point, the 

 two parts diverge, the outer green covering falls off, and the 

 pod becomes black, shrivelled, hard, and woody. The seeds 

 are large, black, wrinkled, irregular in form, and retain their 

 germinative properties three years. 



Sowing and Cultivation. The Martynia is of easy culti- 



