AMARANTACE^E. (AMABANTH FAMILY.) 367 



9. SALS 6 LA, L. SALTWORT. 



Flowers perfect, with 2 bractlets. Calyx 5-parted, persistent and enclosing 

 the depressed fruit in its base ; its divisions at length horizontally winged on the 

 back, the wings forming a broad and circular scarious border. Stamens mostly 

 5. Styles 2. Seed horizontal, without albumen, filled by the embryo, which is 

 coiled in a conical spiral (cochleate). Herbs, or slightly shrubby branching 

 plants, of the sea-shore, Avith fleshy and rather terete or awl-shaped leaves, often 

 spiny-tipped, and sessile axillary flowers. (Name from sal, salt; in allusion to 

 the alkaline salts these plants copiously contain.) 



1. S. Kali, L. (Co3iMON SALTWORT.) Annual, diffusely branching, 

 rough or sraoothish ; leaves alternate, awl-shaped, prickly-pointed ; flowers sin- 

 gle ; calyx with the converging lobes forming a sort of beak over the fruit, the 

 large rose or flesh-colored wings nearly orbicular and spreading. Sandy sea- 

 shore ; common. August. A very prickly bush-like plant. (Eu.) 



BETA VULGARIS, the BEET, with its varieties, the Scarcity and Mangel Wurt- 

 zd, and SFINACIA OLERACEA, the SPINACH, well-known esculent plants, 

 also belong to this family. 



ORDER 91. AMARANTACE^E. (AMARANTH FAMILY.) 



Weedy herbs, with nearly the characters of the last family, but the flower 

 mostly imbricated with dry and scarious persistent bracts, often colored, com- 

 monly 3 in number; the one-celled ovary many-ovuled in one tribe. (The 

 greater part of the order tropical, but several have found their way north- 

 ward as weeds.) 



Synopsis. 



TMBE I. ACHYRANTHE IE. Anthers 2-celled. Ovary 1-ovuled. Utricle 1-seeded. 



* Flowers monoecious or sometimes perfect. 

 J. AMARANTUS. Calyx of 5 or 3 sepals, and 3-bracted. Fruit opening transversely (dr- 



cumcissile) ; the upper part falling away. 

 2. BUXOLUS. Calyx mostly of 3 sepals Fruit indeMscent or bursting irregularly. 



* * Flowers dioecious : calyx none in the fertile flowers. 

 8. MONTELIA. Fruit a thin and even utricle, opening transversely, as in No. 1. Stigmas 



long, plumose-hairy. 

 4. ACNIDA. Fruit 3 -5-angled and fleshy, indehiscent. 



TRIBE II. GOMPHRENEJE. Anthers l-clled. Ovary and fruit as in Tribe L 

 6. IRESINE. Calyx of 5 sepals. Stamens united below into a cup. 

 6. FRCELICIHA. Calyx 5-cleft at the apex. Filaments united throughout into a tube. 



1. AMARANTUS, Tourn. AMARANTH. 



Flowers monceciously polygamous, 3-bracted. Calyx of 5, or rarely 3, equal 

 erect sepals, glabrous. Stamens 5, rarely 3, separate : anthers 2-celled. Stig- 

 mas 2 or 3. Fruit an ovoid 1-seeded membranaceous utricle, 2-3-beaked at 

 the apex, mostly longer than the calyx, opening transversely all round, the 



21 



