186 CUCURBITACE^E. (GOURD FAMILY.) 



2. P. incarnelta, L. Nearly smooth ; leaves 3-cleft ; the lobes serrate ; peti- 

 ole bearing 2 glands ; flower large (2' broad), nearly white, with a triple purple 

 and flesh-colored crown ; involucre 3-leaved. Dry soil, Virginia, Kentucky, 

 and southward. May - July. Fruit of the size of a hen's egg, oval, called 

 Mai/pops. 



ORDER 45. CUCURBIT ACE 2B. (GOURD FAMILY.) 



Mostly succulent kerbs with tendrils, dioecious or monoecious (often mono- 

 petalous') flowers, the calyx-tube cohering with the 1 - 3-celled ovary, and the 

 5 or usually 2^ stamens (i. e. one with a one-celled and 2 with two-celled 

 anthers) commonly united by their often tortuous anthers, and sometimes also 

 by the filaments. Fruit (pepo) fleshy, or sometimes membranaceous. 

 Limb of the calyx and corolla usually more or less combined. .Stigmas 2 

 or 3. Seeds large, usually flat, anatropous, with no albumen. Cotyledons 

 leaf-like. Leaves alternate, palmately lobed or veined. Mostly a trop- 

 ical or subtropical order ; represented in cultivation by the GOURD (LA- 



GEXARIA VULGARIS), PUMPKIN and SQUASH (species of CUCURBITA), 

 MUSKMELON (CtCUMIS MfiLO), CUCUMBER (C. SATIVUS), and WA- 

 TERMELON (CITRULLUS VULGARIS) ; while as wild plants, there are only 

 the three following : 



1. Sicyos. Corolla of the sterile flowers flat and spreading, 5-lobed. Fruit prickly, indebis- 



cent, 1-celled, 1 -seeded. 



2. Et-h inocystis. Corolla of the sterile flowers flat and spreading, 6-parted. Pod prickly, 



2-celled, 4-seeded, bursting at the top. 



3. Melothria. Corolla of the sterile flowers somewhat campanulate, 5-cleft. Berry smooth, 



many-seeded. 



1. SlCYOS, L. ONE-SEEDED STAR-CUCUMBER. 



Flowers monoecious. Petals 5, united below into a bell-shaped or flattish co- 

 rolla. Anthers cohering in a mass. Ovary 1-celled, with a single suspended 

 ovule : style slender : stigmas 3. Fruit ovate, dry and indehiscent, filled by the 

 single seed, covered with barbed prickly bristles which are readily detached. 

 Climbing annuals, with 3-forked tendrils, small whitish flowers ; the sterile and 

 fertile mostly from the same axils, the former corymbed, the latter in a capitate 

 cluster, long-peduncled. (Greek name for the Cucumber.) 



1. S. angul&tus, L. Leaves roundish heart-shaped, 5-angled or lobed, 

 the lobes pointed ; plant clammy-hairy. River-banks ; and a weed in damp 

 yards. July - Sept. 



2. ECHINOCYSTIS, Torr. & Gray. WILD BALSAM-APPLE. 



Flowers monoacious. Petals 6, lanceolate, united at the base into an open 

 spreading corolla. Anthers more or less united. Ovary 2-celled, with 2 erect 

 ovules in each cell : stigma broad. Fruit fleshy, at length dry, clothed with 

 weak prickles, bursting at the summit, 2-celled, 4-seeded, the inner part fibrous- 

 netted. Seeds large, with a thickish hard coat. Tall climbing plants, nearly 

 smooth, with 3-forked tendrils, thin leaves, and very numerous small greenish- 



