CLXXX. AMARANTACE.E. 635 



farina of its seed, which is a substitute for that of the cereals. It is a native of North Asia, grows in the 

 poorest soil, requires little care in cultivation, ripens quickly, and is now extensively grown in the most 

 sterile countries of Europe ; it is also used for feeding fowls, and bees find a copious supply of 

 honey in its flowers. Another species of Buckwheat (P. tataricum) is cultivated with the preceding ; 

 it is hardier, and succeeds on high mountains, but its farina is slightly bitter. The leaves of certain 

 Polygonums yield a dye-stuff; as P. tinctorium, cultivated from time immemorial in China for the 

 extraction of a blue dyeing substance identical with indigo ; its cultivation was introduced into France 

 in 1834. Coccoloba uoifera, the Seaside Grape, is a West Indian and South American littoral shrub, 

 whose inspissated juice, called American Kino and False Rhatany, is a strong astringent. Calliyonum 

 Pallasia is a small leafless tree, growing in the sands of South Siberia, whose cooked root yields a 

 gum and mucilage, which the Kalmucks eat to stay their hunger ; they also appease their thirst with 

 its young shoots and acidulous fruits. [Some Polygonums (as P. Hydropiper) are so acrid as to 

 blister the skin. Rumex alpitms, or Monk's Rhubarb, a European species, was formerly in great 

 repute. R. scutatus is still much cultivated as a Sorrel. The leaves of Oxyria reniformis are a most 

 grateful acid. ED.] 



CLXXX. AMARANTACEJS. 



(AMARANTI, Jussieu. AMARANTOIDE^E, Ventenat. AMARANTACE^E, Br.) 



Herbaceous or suffruticose PLANTS, sometimes frutescent, glabrous, pubescent or 



woolly. STEM and BRANCHES often diffuse, cylindric or sub-angular, continuous or 



jointed, erect or ascending, sometimes twining (Hablitzia). LEAVES opposite or 



alternate, simple, sessile or shortly petioled, membranous or a little fleshy, usually 



entire ; stipules 0. FLOWERS small, regular or sub-regular, $ or diclinous, sessile, 



solitary or in glomerules heads or spikes, the lateral ones sometimes arrested or 



developed into crests awns or hooked hairs ; bracts 3, rarely 2, usually contiguous, 



the lowest largest, usually persistent, rarely leafy, the lateral very often keeled, 



concave, never leafy, scarious, deciduous with the flower. CALYX of 3-5 sepals, or 



very rarely 1 (Mengea), distinct or sometimes more or less coherent at the base, 



equal or sub-equal, sub-scarious, glabrous or furnished with accrescent wool, 



petaloid or greenish, persistent, aestivation imbricate. COROLLA 0. STAMENS 



hypogynous, 5 fertile, opposite to the sepals (rarely 3 or fewer), with or without 



alternating staminodes, all free, or united below in a cup or tube ; filaments filiform, 



subulate or dilated, sometimes 3-fid; staminodes entire or fringed, flat or rarely 



concave, sometimes very small and tooth-shaped, or lobulate ; anthers introrse, 



1-2-celled, erect, ovoid or linear, dorsifixed, dehiscence longitudinal. OVARY free, 



compressed, rarely depressed, 1-carpelled, 1-celled ; style terminal, simple, various in 



length, sometimes obsolete ; stigma capitate, emarginate, 2-lobed or 2-3-fid ; ovules 



1 or more, curved, basal, or suspended singly from separate erect funicles ; micropyle 



inferior. FRUIT usually enveloped in the calyx, sometimes a membranous 2- or 



more-seeded utricle, or rupturing irregularly or circuuisciss, or a caryopsis, rarely a 



berry. SEEDS usually somewhat compressed, reniform, vertical ; testa crustaceous, 



