LILIACE^E. (LILY FAMILY.) 517 



quite down to the micropyle, the persistent seed-stalk thus forming a sort of 

 lateral beak. Eadicle inferior ! Stemless small herbs, with grassy and hairy 

 linear leaves and slender few-flowered scapes, from a solid bulb. (An old 

 name for a plant having sourish leaves, from virovs, sub-acid.) 



1. H. er^Cta, L. Leaves linear, grass-like, longer than the umbellately 

 1 - 4-fl owered scape ; divisions of the perianth hairy and greenish outside, yel- 

 low within. Meadows and open woods, N. Eng. to Fla., west to Minn., E. Kan., 

 and Tex. 



ORDER 115. DIOSCOKEACEJE. (YAM FAMILY.) 



Plants with twining stems from large tuberous roots or knotted rootstocks, 

 and ribbed and netted-veined petioled leaves, small dioecious 6-androus and 

 regulars/lowers, with the 6-cleft calyx-like perianth adherent in the fertile 

 plant to the 3-celled ovary. Styles 3, distinct. Ovules 1 or 2 in each cell, 

 anatropous. Fruit usually a membranaceous 3-angled or winged capsule. 

 Seeds with a minute embryo in hard albumen. 



1. DIOSCOBiJA, Plumier. YAM. 



Flowers very small, in axillary panicles or racemes. Stamens 6, at the base 

 of the divisions of the 6-parted perianth. Capsule 3-celled, 3-winged, loculi- 

 cidally 3-valved by splitting through the winged angles. Seeds 1 or 2 in each 

 cell, flat, with a membranaceous wing. (Dedicated to the Greek naturalist, 

 Dioscorides.) 



1. D. vil!6sa, L. (WILD YAM-ROOT.) Herbaceous. Stems slender, from 

 knotty and matted rootstocks, twining over bushes ; leaves mostly alternate, 

 sometimes nearly opposite or in fours, more or less downy beneath, heart- 

 shaped, conspicuously pointed, 9- 11-ribbed ; flowers pale greenish-yellow, the 

 sterile in drooping panicles, the fertile in drooping simple racemes ; capsules 

 8 - 10" long. Thickets, S. New Eng. to Fla., west to Minn., Kan., and Tex. 



ORDER 116. LILIA.CEJE. (LiLY FAMILY.) 



Herbs, or rarely woody plants, with regular and symmetrical almost always 

 6-androus flowers ; the perianth not glumaceous, free from the chiefly 3- 

 celled ovary ; the stamens one before each of its divisions or lobes (i. e. 6, in 

 one instance 4), with 2-celled anthers ; fruit a few -many-seeded pod or 

 berry ; the small embryo enclosed in copious albumen. Seeds anatropous 

 or amphitropous (orthotropous in Smilax). Flowers not from a spathe, 

 except in Allium; the outer and inner ranks of the perianth colored 

 alike (or nearly so) and generally similar, except in Trillium. 



SUBORDER I. Smilaceae. Shrubby or rarely herbaceous, the petiole 

 of the 3 - 9-nerved netted-veined leaves often tendril-bearing. Flowers (in 

 ' ours) dioecious, in axillary umbels, small, with regular 6-parted deciduous 

 perianth. Anthers apparently 1-celled. Stigmas 3, sessile. Fruit a 

 3-celled berry, with 1-2 pendulous orthotropous seeds in each cell. 

 Embryo minute in horny albumen. 

 1. Smilax. Characters as above. 



