STOEAX FAMILY. 277 



good stamens before them, and as many petal-like sterile ones or scales 

 alternating; ovary 5-celled, hairy; style 1, pointed; fruit cherry -like, 

 containing a single, large, stony-coated seed ; small trees or shrubs, with 

 branches often spiny, and deciduous but thickish leaves, entire. Flow- 

 ers summer ; fruit purple or blackish. Natives of river banks, etc. 



B. lycioldes, Pers. SOUTHERN BUCKTHORN. Smooth, with obovate- 

 oblong or lance-wedge-shaped leaves, 2'-4' long, and greenish flowers. 

 Va., S. and W. 



B. tfcnax, Willd. Still more southern, has smaller leaves brown-silky 

 underneath, and a shorter white corolla. 



B. lanugindsa, Pers. Dry soil from S. Illinois, S. ; has leaves rusty- 

 hairy or woolly beneath, and white corolla. 



LXIX. EBENACE^l, EBONY FAMILY. 



Trees, with hard wood, no milky juice, alternate entire 

 leaves, from 2 to 4 times as many stamens as there are lobes 

 to the corolla, several-celled ovary, with a single ovule hang- 

 ing in each cell, and edible berry with large, hard-coated seeds. 



1. DIOSPYROS, PERSIMMON, DATE PLUM. (Greek: Jove's 

 grain or fruit.} Flowers polygamous or dioecious, the fertile ones 

 single in axils of leaves, the sterile smaller and often clustered ; calyx 

 and corolla each 4-6-lobed ; stamens about 16 in the sterile, 8 imper- 

 fect ones in the fertile flowers, inserted on the tube of the corolla; 

 anthers turned inwards ; fruit edible when very ripe, plum-like, globu- 

 lar, surrounded at base by the persistent thickish calyx. Flowers early 

 summer. 



D. Virginiana, Linn. COMMON P. S. N. Eng. to 111. and S. ; tree 

 20-60 high, with very hard blackish wood ; nearly smooth, thickish, ovate 

 leaves ; very short peduncles ; 4-parted calyx ; pale-yellow, 4-cleft corolla ; 

 4 styles, 2-lobed at tip ; 8-celled ovary, and plum-like fruit, green and very 

 acerb, but yellow, sweet, and eatable after frost. 



D. K6ki, Linn. f. KAKI, JAPANESE P. Tree reaching 40 in height, 

 upright at first, but becoming spreading and crooked with age ; leaves 

 large, ovate-elliptic and acuminate, shining; flowers small, greenish- 

 yellow ; fruit mostly very large, variable in shape and color. The chief 

 tree fruit of Japan, and now planted in the S. States. 



LXX. STYRACACE^J, STOKAX FAMILY. 



Shrubs or trees, with alternate simple leaves, perfect flowers 

 with 4-8 petals more or less united at the base, and bearing 

 twice as many or indefinitely numerous partly monadelphous 

 or polyadelphous stamens, only one style, and a 1-5-celled 1- 

 5-seeded fruit. Ovules as many as 2 in each cell. Calyx in 

 ours coherent more or less with the 2-4-celled ovary. 



