ARACE^E. (ARUM FAMILY.) 475 



CLASS II. MONOCOTYLEDONOUS OB EN- 

 DOGENOUS PLANTS. 



Stems with no manifest distinction into bark, wood, and 

 pith ; but the woody fibre and vessels in bundles or threads 

 which are irregularly imbedded in the cellular tissue : peren- 

 nial trunks destitute of annual layers. Leaves mostly paral- 

 lel-veined (nerved) and sheathing at the base, seldom sepa- 

 rating by an articulation, almost always alternate or scattered 

 and not toothed. Parts of the flower commonly in threes. 

 Embryo with a single cotyledon, and the leaves of the plu- 

 mule alternate. 



ORDER 107. ARACE^. (ARUM FAMILY.) 



Plants with acrid or pungent juice, simple or compound often veiny leaves, 

 and flowers crowded on a spadix, which is usually surrounded by a spathe. 

 Floral envelopes none, or of 4 -6 sepals. Fruit usually a berry. Seeds 

 with fleshy albumen, or none but filled with the large fleshy embryo in 

 Nos. 2, 4, and 5. A large family, chiefly tropical. Herbage abounding 

 in slender rbaphides. The genuine Araceas have no floral envelopes, and 

 are almost all monoecious or dioecious : but the genera of the second section 

 with more highly developed flowers are not to be separated. 



* Spathe surrounding or subtending the spathe : flowers naked ; i. e. without perianth. 



1. Ariseema. Flowers monoecious or dioecious, covering only the base of the spadix. 



2. Pel tan dra. Flowers monoecious, covering the spadix ; anthers above, ovaries below. 



3. Call a. Flowers perfect (at least the lower ones), covering the whole of the short spadix. 



Spathe open and spreading. 



* * Spathe surrounding the spadix in No. 4, none or imperfect in the rest : flowers with a 

 calyx or perianth and perfect, covering the whole spadix. 



4. Symplncarpus. Spadix globular, in a fleshy shell-shaped spathe. Stemless. 



5. Oroiitiutn. Spadix narrow, naked, terminating the terete scape. 



6. Acorus. Spadix cylindrical, borne on the side of a leaf-like scape. 



1. A II IS JEM A, Martius. INDIAN TURNIP. DRAGON- ARUM. 



Spathe convolute below and mostly arched above. Flowers monoecious or 

 by abortion dioecious, covering only the base of the spadix, which is elongated 

 and naked above. Floral envelopes none. Sterile flowers above the fertile, 

 each of a cluster of almost sessile 2 - 4-celled anthers, opening by pores or chinks 

 at the top. Fertile flowers consisting each of a 1 -celled ovary, tipped with a 

 depressed stigma, and containing 5 or 6 orthotropous ovules erect from the base 



