210 



NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



above into five subequal or unequal lobes (the anterior being the 

 longest), valvate or subimbricate in the bud. The unequal petals 

 form an irregular papilionaceous corolla. All or most of them cohere 

 by their claws for a variable extent into a tube completed b} r its 

 being adnate to the staminal sheath. The standard is elongated 

 and longer than the wings, which again are longer than the keel. 

 The stamens are diadelphous, nine being united to one another and 

 to the corolla, while the tenth is free, or only sticks for some way to 

 both edges of the cleft of the tube formed by the nine others. 

 The ovary is sessile or stipitate, usually almost superior owing to 

 the form of the receptacle. It tapers above into an incurved or in- 

 flexed, slender or more or less swollen style, with a terminal capitate 

 or oblique dorsal stigma. Within we find one or more descending 

 campylotropous ovules whose micropyles look upwards and out- 

 wards. 1 The fruit is an oblong pod, 2 c} r lindrical, or more rarely 

 obovate-compressed, surrounded by the marcescent calyx or corolla, 

 and usually membranous, with one or few seeds. The campylo- 

 tropous seeds have a bowed exalbuminous embryo with an inflexed 

 radicle. This genus consists of herbs with compound digitate leaves, 

 usually trifoliolate, but rarely with more leaflets ; the leaflets, again, 

 may be exceptionally pinnate. The two lateral stipules are adnate 

 to the petiole. The flowers form a sort of capitula or shortly pedi- 

 cellate false umbels ; these inflorescences are sometimes unilateral, 3 or 

 the flowers are more rarely solitary. The inflorescences are axillary 

 leaf-opposed. The flowers are axillary to membranous bracts, 

 persistent or caducous or narrow and ill-developed, and even 

 sometimes quite rudiinentaiy. There are probably not more than 

 a hundred and fifty species of this genus, plants from all temperate 

 climates. 4 



Next in order in the series Tri/oliea comes the genus Medick 



1 They have two coats. 



2 Usually iudehiscent. 



3 See Te£cul, in Bull. Soc. Bot. de Fr.. i. J 23. 



4 Jacq., Fl. Au.str., t. 40, 385, 386, 433 ; 

 Bort. Vindob., t. 60.— H. B. K., Nov. Gen. et 

 Spec, vi. t. 593. — K., Mimos., t. 53. — Sati, 

 Trifol. (1810).— Hook., Fl. Bor.-Amer., t. 48- 

 50 ; Icon., t. 281, 286 (275).— Peesl., Symbol., 

 t. 30-34.— Ledeb., Icon. Fl. Boss., t. 96. — 

 Vis., FL Dalmat., t. 44, 45.— Desf., Fl. Atlant., 

 t. 208, 2 .19.— BECT., Phyt. Lusit., t. 61-<W.— 



Moris, Fl. Sard.,t. 60-64.— Hoox. & Aen., 

 Beech. Voij. Bot., t. 78, 79. — Jaub. & SPACH, 

 III. Plant. Orient.,t. 139, 140. — Mobtc, PL 

 fl o. Am .. t. 2. — Gbkn. i\. Godb., Fl. de Fr., 

 i 403, 508.— Haev. & SoiTD., Fl. Cap., ii. 158.— 

 Bakee, in Oliv. FL Trop. Afr., ii. 53.— Bot. 

 Beg., t, 1070, 1883.— Bot. May., t. 328, 557, 

 879, 1168, 2779, 2790, 3471, 3702.— WilP, 

 /.' p., i. 639 ; ii. 850 ; v. 512 ; Ann., i. 226 ; ii. 

 348 j iv. 474. 



