STAFF-TREE FAMILY. Celastraceas 



9 



STAFF-TREE FAMILY. Celastracece. 



Shrubs with simple opposite or alternate leaves, and 

 small regular, generally perfect flowers with 4-5 petals 

 and as many stamens inserted on a disc set at the base of 

 the ovary (or sometimes merged into it) and at the bot- 

 tom of the calyx. Fruit a pod with 2-5 cells. Insect 

 visitors commonly bees. 



A twining, shrubby vine common on old 



n ? stone walls and roadside thickets, and 



tersweet ' 



Waxwork sometimes climbing trees to a height of 



Ceiastrus twenty or more feet. The light green 



scandens leaves are smooth and ovate or ovate- 



reen s oblong, finely toothed, and acute at the 



June tip ; they grow alternately and somewhat 



in ranks owing to the twisting of the stem. 

 The tiny flowers are greenish white, and grouped in a 

 loose, spikelike terminal cluster ; the five minute petals 

 are finely toothed along the edge, and the five stamens 

 are inserted on a cup-shaped disc, in the manner ex- 

 plained above. The flowers are succeeded in September 

 by the beautiful orange fruit, a globular berry in loose 

 clusters, but properly speaking a capsule whose orange 

 shell divides into three parts, bends backward, and ex- 

 poses the pulpy scarlet envelop of the seed within. The 

 fruit is charmingly decorative, and if it is picked and 

 placed in a warm room before the shells open, it will ex- 

 pand and remain in a perfect condition thoughout the 

 winter. Climbing 6-25 feet. Along roadsides, streams, 

 etc., from Me., south to N. Car., among the mountains, 

 and west to the Daks., Kan., Oklahoma, and N. Mex 

 Rare in the White Mountain region of N. H. 



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