274 



EUPIIORBIACE/E. 



[Diclinous Exogens. 



Order XC. EUPHORBIACEtE.— Spurgeworts. 



Euphorbia?, Just. G,'». 385. (17*9).— Euphorbiaceae, Ad. deJitxx. Monogr. '1824) ; E»dl. ccxliii. ; Meix- 

 ner, p. 336 ; Klotzsch in Erich*. Archiv. 7. 175. (1841).— Trewiaceae, Ed. prior, p. 174.— Pseudan- 

 thea-, E'idl. p. 328.— AnthoboleEe, Endl. p. 323?— Putranjivere, Endl. p. 287. 



Diagnosis. — Euphorbial Exocjens, with definite suspended anatropal ovules, scattered 



flowers, and tricoccous fruit. 



Trees, shrubs, or herbaceous plants, often abounding in acrid milk. Leaves opposite 

 or alternate, simple, rarely compound, often with stipules. Flowers axillary or terminal, 



Fig. CLXXXVII. 



arranged in various ways, sometimes inclosed within an involucre resembling a calyx. 

 Flowers $ ?. Calyx inferior, with various glandular or scaly internal appendages ; 

 (sometimes wanting.) Corolla either consisting of petals or scales equal in number to 

 the sepals, or absent, or sometimes more numerous than, the sepals ; sometimes monope- 

 talous. $ Stamens definite or indefinite, distinct or monad el phous ; anthers 2-celled, 

 sometimes opening by pores. ? Ovary free, sessile, or stalked, 1- 2- 3- or more celled ; 

 ovules solitary or twin, suspended from the inner angle of the cell ; styles equal in num- 

 ber to the cells, sometimes distinct, sometimes combined, sometimes none ; stigma com- 

 pound, or single with several lobes. Fruit generally tricoccous, consisting of 3 carpels 

 splitting and separating with elasticity from their common axis, occasionally fleshy and 

 indebiscent. Seeds solitary or twin, suspended, often with an aril ; embryo inclosed in 

 fleshy albumen ; cotyledons flat ; radicle superior. 



No group of plant's can illustrate better than this the entangled nature ot botanical 

 affinities ; for it claims kindred in an almost equal degree with Nettleworts, because ot its 

 unisexuality, and with Rhamnads and Mallowworts when that circumstance is left out ot 

 consideration. Bv the school of Jussien it is considered an apetalous Order, with a 

 tendency to form a corolla ; by myself and others it is regarded as a polypetalous Order, 

 losing its petals in a part of the species. 



The reason for considering Spurgeworts as an apetalous Order is because of the want 

 of a corolla in the genera with which European Botanists are most familiar. But it, 

 instead of considering the imperfectly developed genera of Europe as typical of the true 

 structure of the Order, we look to those of tropical countries, we find that the apetalous 

 character by no means holds good with them. In Aleurites, for example, the petals are 

 as much developed as in a Malvaceous plant ; the same thing occurs in Jatropha, Elueo- 

 cocca, and others ; and, in fact, upon looking through the genera described by Adnen de 

 Jussieu in his Monograph, it appears that out of 61 genera no fewer than 32 have petals. 

 The tendency of the Order is, therefore, at least as great to form petals as to want them. 

 Now if this be so, and the separation of sexes be disregarded, it will be found 

 that it is with Mallowworts, on the one hand, and Rhamnads , on the other, that they 



Fie (XXXXVII.— Andrachnetelephioides. 1. A male flower ; 2. a female flower; 3.»ptatjl with 

 the scales at its base ; 4. a transverse section oi an ovary ; 5. a ripe seed ; fi. a vertical section of it. 



