50 



Ranunculaceae. 



Paeonia. Paeony. 

 (Family Ranunculaceae). 



Small unsymmetrically 

 ^ branched shrubs (most species 

 herbaceous). Twigs terete, stout: 

 pith large, round, continuous. 

 Buds moderate, the upper much 

 larger, solitary, sessile, ovoid or 

 rather oblong, with about half-a- 

 dozen pointed scales, end-bud 

 lacking. Leaf-scars alternate, 

 somewhat raised, large, triangu- 

 lar or half-round: bundle-traces 

 about 7 in a U-shaped series and 

 small with a larger one central in 

 the scar: stipule-scars lacking. 



The tree paeony has shared in 

 the popular approval that paeonies 

 have received of late years, and 

 like the herbaceous species it is 

 now grown in a large variety of 

 forms which differ greatly in their 

 flowers. 

 Paeonia differs from other Ranunculaceae in having the 

 septa between the ends of the cells that forms its ducts per- 

 forated by a series of transverse slits (scalariform perfora- 

 tions), the cross-wall disappearing entirely in other genera. 

 Its winter-characters are figured by Schneider, p. 119, f. 121. 

 Buds more or less rosy: glabrous. (Tree paeony). 



P. suffruticosa. 



