PURSLANE FAMILY. Portulacaceae. 



PURSLANE FAMILY. P ortulacaceoc. 



A rather small family, mostly American; herbs, usually 

 with thick, succulent leaves and stems, with flowers open- 

 ing only in sunlight. They usuaJly have only two sepals, 

 but the petals number from two to five or more; the sta- 

 mens are sometimes numerous, but when they are of the 

 same number as the petals they are opposite them; the 

 one-celled ovary is superior, becoming a many-seeded 

 capsule. Pusley, or Purslane, is one of the commonest 

 garden weeds; everybody knows how difficult it is to keep 

 the spreading rosettes out of gravel walks, and we are all 

 familiar with the gaudy, ephemeral flowers of the culti- 

 vated Portulaca. The Purslane-tree, or Spek-boom, of 

 South Africa is often the principal food of elephants and 

 its foliage gives the characteristic coloring to the landscape. 



There are several kinds of Montia, closely related to 

 Claytonia, mostly natives of North America, rather 

 succulent plants, very smooth and often with a "bloom.'* 

 The flowers are white or pinkish, with two sepals; the five 

 petals, equal or somewhat unequal, separate or more or 

 less united at base; the stamens five or three; the style 

 branches three; the capsule with three valves and one to 

 three, shiny, black seeds, which when ripe are shot out of 

 the capsule by the elastic closing of the valves. 



-_. The Indians gather these pretty succu- 



Mmer's Lettuce 



Montia parvifldra lent llttle plants for salad and indeed the 

 White tender, bright-green leaves look as if they 



Spring, summer would taste very nice. They grow in a 

 West, except Anz. loose bunch, with several stems, a few 

 inches to a foot high. The root-leaves have long leaf- 

 stalks and vary very much in size and shape, the earliest 

 being long and narrow, like little green tongues, but the 



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