314 



SYSTEMATIC BOTANY. 



Character. 



Thalamus flat. Calyx free, or rarely 4- or 6-cleft, persistent, or 

 the upper part separating by transverse dehiscence, mostly 

 growing somewhat during the ripening of the fruit (accrescent). 

 Corolla gamopetalous, 5- or rarely 4- or 6-parted or toothed, 

 rotate, campanulate, funnel- or salver-shaped, sometimes ob- 

 liquely irregular, plaited-imbricate, plaited-convolute, or involu- 

 tive-valvate in the bud. Stamens springing from the tube of the 

 corolla, equal in number to its lobes and alternate with them ; 

 filaments sometimes rather unequal ; anthers 2-celled, with the 



Fig. 414. 



a, Corolla of Atropa Belladonna, showing the attachment of the stamens; 

 6, cross section of the oyary. 



cells sometimes connate above, dehiscing longitudinally or by 

 terminal pores. Ovary usually 2-celled, the carpels antero- 

 posterior ; placentas axile, sometimes enlarged into spurious 

 dissepiments, rendering the ovary 4-celled ; ovary rarely 3-5- 

 celled by increased number of carpels ; ovules numerous ; style 

 simple ; stigma simple or lobed. Fruit capsular, with septicidal 

 or transverse dehiscence (fig. 294), or a succulent or dryish in- 

 dehiscent berry (fig. 301) ; seeds numerous, the embryo mostly 

 slender and curved, sometimes straight, with foliaceous coty- 

 ledons in fleshy perisperm. 



Petunia, Juss. 

 Nicotiana. Tournef. 

 Datura, L. 



ILLUSTRATIVE GENERA. 



Hyoscyamus, Tournef. 

 Physalis, L. 

 Capsicum, Tournef. 



Solanum, L. 

 Atropa, L. 

 Mandragora, Tournef. 



Affinities, &c. A considerable range of variation in the condition of most 

 of the organs upon which a character is founded renders it difficult to 

 circumscribe this Order strictly; in fact it passes by almost insensible 

 gradations into the Scrophulariaceee. Generally speaking, the Solanacese 



