XXIII. UUTICACE.E. 



Fig. 535. 



Mule flower dia- 

 gram. 



I. NETTLE SERIES. 



This order was formerly made to include a large number of types 

 now separated from it ; it is at present restricted to plants closely 

 resembling the 

 Nettles and Pelli- Ur,i mp!l ^„. 



tories, which were 

 formerly united 

 into the group of 

 Urticece proper. 

 The flowers of 

 the Nettles 1 (figs. 

 533-538) are uni- 

 sexual, mono- 

 chlamydeous, and 

 tetramerous, usu- 

 ally regular. The 

 male flower (figs. 

 534, 535) of 

 Urfica pilulifera 

 has a little convex 

 receptacle bearing 

 four sepals, two of which are lateral, and four superposed stamens. 

 The sepals are free or slightly coherent below, and so imbricated in 

 the bud that the lateral pair are overlapped by the antero-posterior, 

 or else subvalvate. 2 The stamens are free, inserted below the base of a 

 little central body, often circular and cupuliform ; each consists of a 

 filament and an introrse two-celled anther, which dehisces longitudin- 



Fig. 533. 



Flowering branch. 



Fig. 531. 

 Male flower (f). 



1 JTrtica T., Inst., 534, t. 308.— L., Gen., n. 

 1054. — Adaxs., Fam. des PI., ii. 376. — J., 

 Gen., 403. — Lame., Diet., iv. 636 ; Suppl., iv. 

 217 ; III., t. 761.— Nees, Gen., ii. 28— Gaudich., 

 Yog. Uran., JBot., 496. — Exdl., Gen., n. 1879 

 (part.). — Pater, Organog., 275, t. 60. — Wedd., 



VOL. III. 



Monogr. de la Fam. des Urticees, 55, t. 1, C ; in 

 DC. Prodr., xvi. sect. i. 39. 



2 The bud is depressed above. The outer face 

 of the sepals bears, like most of the organs, a 

 variable number of urticating hairs, chiefly borne 

 on the prominent veins. 



K K 



