338 SOLANACE^E. (NIGHTSHADE FAMILY.) 



with a smaller, slenderer, more exserted corolla ; C. (Lepidanche) adprcssa, 

 Engelm., is the Western form, with a larger, shorter, nearly included corolla. 

 Both grow almost entirely on shrubs ; the first in the Alkghanies, from Pennsyl- 

 vania southward; the latter from Western Virginia to the Mississippi and 

 Missouri, in fertile shady bottoms. The clusters in fruit are sometimes 2' in 

 diameter. 



9. C. giomeraJa, Choisy. Flowers very densely clustered, forming 

 knotty masses closely encircling the stem of the foster plant, much imbricated 

 with scarious oblong bracts with recurved-spreading lips; sepals nearly similar, 

 shorter than the oblong-cylindrical tube of the corolla ; stamens nearly as long 

 as the oblong-lanceolate obtuse spreading or reflexed lobes of the corolla ; scales 

 large, fringcd-pinnatifid ; styles slender, longer than the pointed ovary; the 

 pointed pod mostly 1 - 2-secded. (Lepidanche Cornpositarum, Engelm.) Moist 

 prairies, from Ohio and Michigan southwestward : growing mostly on tall Com- 

 posite. The orange-colored stems soon disappear, leaving only the close coils 

 of flowers, appearing like whitish ropes twisted around the stems. 



ORDER 82. SOLANACE^E. (NIGHTSHADE FAMILY.) 



Herbs (or rarely shrubs), tvith a colorless juice and alternate leaves, regu- 

 lar 5-merous and 5-androus flowers, on bractless pedicels ; the corolla plaited' 

 imbricate, plaited-convolute, or infolded-valvate in the bud, and the fruit a 

 2-celled (rarely 3 - 5-cetted) many-seeded pod or berry. Seeds campy- 

 lotropous or amphitropous. Embryo mostly slender and curved in fleshy 

 albumen. Calyx usually persistent. Stamens mostly equal, inserted on the 

 corolla. Style and stigma single. Placentae in the axis, often projecting 

 far into the cells. (Foliage and usually the fruits more or less narcotic, 

 often very poisonous.) A large family in the tropics, but very few indige- 

 nous in our district. It shades off into Scrophulariaceae, from which the 

 plaited regular corolla and 5 equal stamens generally distinguish it 



Synopsis. 



* Corolla wheel-shaped, 5-parted or cleft; the lobes valvate with the margins turned inwards 



in the bud. Anthers connivent. Fruit a berry. 

 1. SOLANUM Anthers opening by pores or chinks at the tip. 

 * Corolla bell-shaped or bell-funnel-form, somewhat 5-lobed or entire, plaited in the bud . 



Anthers separate. Calyx enlarged and bladdery in fruit, enclosing the berry. 

 2 PHYSALIS. Calyx 5-cleft. Berry juicy, 2-celled. 



3. NICANDRA. Calyx 5-parted. Corolla nearly entire. Berry dry, 3-5-celled. 



* * Corolla funnel-form or tubular, the spreading border 5-lobed or toothed, plaited in the 



bud. Anthers separate. Fruit a dry pod. 

 t- Pod enclosed in the urn-shaped calyx, opening by a lid. 



4. HYOSCYAMUS. Corolla with a short tube, the border somewhat unequal. 



*- - Pod opening lengthwise. Corolla elongated. 



5. DATURA. Calyx prismatic, 5-toothed. Pod prickly, more or less 4-celled, raked. 



6. NICOTIAN A. Calyx tubular-bell-shaped, 5-cleft. Pod smooth, enclosed in the calyx, 



2-celled. 



