THE POLYPETALOUS ORDERS. 383 



States. They are chiefly remarkable for their very large and 

 showy leaves and flowers. The nuts are eatable. 



714. Ord, Nymphscacea (the Water-Lily Family). Aquatic herbs, 

 with showy flowers, and cordate or peltate leaves arising from a 

 prostrate trunk or rhizoma, and raised on long stalks above the 

 water, or floating on its surface. Calyx and corolla of several or 

 numerous imbricated sepals and petals, which gradually pass into 

 each other ; persistent ; the latter inserted on the fleshy torus 

 which surrounds or partly incloses and adheres to the pistil ; the 

 inner series gradually changing into stamens. Stamens numer- 

 ous, in several rows, inserted into the torus with or above the pet- 

 als ; many of the filaments petaloid, the adnate anthers introrse. 

 Fruit indehiscent, pulpy when ripe, many-celled, crowned with the 

 radiate stigmas ; the anatropous seeds covering the spongy dissep- 

 iments. Embryo small, inclosed in a membranous bag, which is 

 situated next the hilum, and half immersed in the mealy albumen. 

 Ex. Nymphrea, the White Water-Lily (Fig. 265-268) ; Nu- 

 phar, the Yellow Pond-Lily. Here belongs the magnificent Vic- 

 toria of tropical South America, the most gigantic and showy of 

 aquatics, both as to its flowers and its leaves. 



715. Ord, Sarraceniaceae (the Water- Pitcher Family). Perennial 

 herbs, growing in bogs; the (purplish or yellowish-green) leaves all 

 radical and hollow, pitcher-shaped (Fig. 223, 224), or trumpet- 

 shaped. Flower solitary on a long scape. Calyx of five persist- 

 ent sepals, with three small bracts at its base. Corolla of five 

 petals. Stamens numerous. Summit of the combined styles very 

 large and petaloid, five-angled, covering the five-celled ovary, per- 

 sistent. Fruit five-celled, five-valved, with a large placenta pro- 

 jecting from the axis into the cells. Seeds numerous, albuminous, 

 with a small embryo. Ex, Sarracenia, from which the above 

 character is taken, was the only known genus of the order, until 

 the recent discovery of Heliamphora in Guiana. The scape of the 

 latter bears several flowers without petals, &c. The species of 

 Sarracenia are all North American, and, excepting S. purpurea, 

 are confined to the Southern States east of the Alleghanies. 



716. Ord, PapaYCraceffi (the Poppy Family). Herbs, with a milky 

 or colored juice, and alternate leaves without stipules. Calyx of 

 two (rarely three) caducous sepals. Corolla of four to six regular 

 petals. Stamens eight to twenty-four, or numerous. Fruit one- 

 celled, either pod-shaped with two to five, or capsular with numer- 



