54 Introduction to Botany. 



i. Alyssum maritimum, L. (L., maritimus, relating to the sea.) SWEET 

 ALYSSUM. White, honey-scented flowers. Stems spreading ; leaves lanceolate 

 or linear, entire, green, or slightly hoary. Rounded pods with a single seed in 

 each cell. Cultivated. 



SAXIFRAGACE^. SAXIFRAGE FAMILY. 



Herbs or shrubs with opposite or alternate, exstipulate leaves. 

 Flowers perfect or polygamo-dicecious. Calyx mostly 5-lobed or 

 parted, usually persistent and more or less adnate to the ovary or free 

 from it. Petals 4-5. Stamens sometimes twice as many as the petals 

 (sometimes more numerous), when of the same number alternate with 

 them, perigynous or epigynous. Carpels i-several, mostly 2, united 

 or free. Styles as many as the carpels or cells of the ovary, or united 

 into i. Fruit a capsule, follicle, or berry; seeds mostly many. 



I. SAXIFRAGA. Saxifrage. 

 (L., saxum, a rock; fran-gere, to break.) 



Perennial herbs. Calyx 5-lobed, free from or adnate to the base 

 of the ovary. Petals 5 and perigynous. Stamens 10, inserted with 

 the petals. Ovary 2-lobed and 2-celled. Capsule 2-beaked. Seeds 

 numerous. 



1. Saxifraga Pennsylvanica, L. SWAMP SAXIFRAGE. Stout, i to 3 or more 

 feet high. Leaves 4 to 10 inches long and sometimes 3 inches wide, varying from 

 oval to oblanceolate, narrowing at the base into a short petiole, clustered at the 

 base. Stem scapose, bearing flowers in large, oblong, open panicles. Calyx 

 reflexed. Petals longer than the calyx, greenish. Follicles divergent when 

 mature. On wet banks or in bogs. 



2. Saxifrage Virginiensis, Michx. EARLY SAXIFRAGE. Scapes 4 to 12 inches 

 high, viscid-pubescent. Leaves obovate-spatulate, narrowing into a petiole, crenate 

 or dentate, i to 3 inches long, or longer. Flowers clustered in cymes, the inflores- 

 cence becoming a loose panicle. Flowers white, to J inch broad. Calyx lobes 

 erect, shorter than the petals. Carpels nearly separate and becoming widely 

 divergent in fruit. Dry hillsides and rocky woodlands. 



II. PHILADELPHIA. Mock Orange or Syringa. 



(Gr.,#7u70s, loving; adelphos, brother. No obvious reason for the name.) 



Shrubs with opposite, petioled, exstipulate leaves. Flowers large, 

 white or cream-colored, terminal or axillary. Calyx tube coherent with 

 the ovary, 4~5-lobed. Petals 4-5, rounded or obovate. Stamens 20-40. 

 Ovary 3-5 -celled; styles 3-5, distinct or united. Capsule top-shaped, 



