118 



DE CANDOLLES SYSTEM. 



3-celled, superior; ovules erect; styles 2 or 3, cohering. 

 Fruit membranous or fleshy. Seeds with a bony testa and no 

 aril ; hilum large ; albumen none. 



USES. Staphylea pinnata and trifolia are cultivated as orna- 

 mental shrubs under the name of Bladder-nuts, because their 

 nut-like seeds are enclosed in a bladdery seed-vessel. 



TYPICAL GENUS. Staphylea. 



53. Rhamwacea. Trees or shrubs. Leaves alternate, with 

 minute stipules. Flowers axillary or terminal, minute. Calyx 

 4-5-cleft, valvate. Petals distinct, inserted into the orifice of 

 the calyx. Stamens definite, opposite the petals, to which 

 they are equal in number. Ovary superior, or half-superior, 2- 

 3- or 4-celled ; ovules solitary, erect ; fruit a capsule, or more 

 frequently a berry ; albumen fleshy, in very small quantity ; 

 embryo with large flat cotyledons, and a short inferior radicle. 



USES. The berries of Rhamnus Frangula, catharticus, and 

 others, are active purgatives. When ripe, those of some species, 

 especially R. catharticus and infectorius, yield a yellow dye. 

 The fruit of Zizyphus communis is the Jujube of the shops, 

 and that of the Z. Lotus gave their name to the Lotophagous 

 nation of antiquity ; all the fruit of that genus seems harm- 

 less ; Z. Chinensis, indeed, is cultivated in China as the apple 

 is with us. The bark of Ceanothus americanus and some 

 others is astringent, and has been employed in diarrhoea. 



TYPICAL GENERA. Rhamnus, Paliurus, Ceanothus. 



A ., 8een from above ' 



4. A seed dmded vertically. 



A frait - 3. The same cut 



