STAFF-TREE FAMILY. 87 



* * Calyx with the disk coherent with the base of the ovary and fruit. 

 4. CEANOTHUS. Erect or depressed shrubs or undershrubs. Petals 5, hood- 

 shaped, spreading, their claws and the filaments slender. Ovary 3-celled, 

 when ripe becoming a cartilaginous or crustaceous 3-seeded pod. 



1. BERCHEMIA, SUPPLE-JACK. (Probably named for some botanist 

 of the name of Berchem.) 



B. VOltlbilis. Common in low grounds S., climbing high trees, smooth, 

 with very tough and lithe stems (whence the popular name), small, oblong- 

 ovate and simply parallel-veined leaves, and greenish-white flowers in small 

 panicles terminating the t>ranchlets, in early summer. 



2. RHAMNUS, BUCKTHORN. (The ancient name ) Flowers green- 

 ish, axillary, mostly in small clusters, commonly polygamous or dioecious, in 

 early summer. Berry-like fruit mawkish. 



* Flowers with petals, the parts in fours: leaves minutely serrate. 

 R. catharticus, COMMON BUCKTHORN. Cult, from Eu., for hedges, 

 run wild in a few places ; forms a small tree, with thorny branchlets, ovate or 

 oblong leaves, and 3 - 4-seeded fruit. 



R.lanceqlatus, NARROW-LEAVED B. Wild from Penn. S. & W. ; shrub 

 not thorny, with lanceolate or oblong leaves, and 2-seeded fruit. 



* * Flowers without petals : stamens and lobes of the calyx 5. 

 R. alnifdlius, ALDER-LEAVED B. Wild in cold swamps N. ; a low shrub, 

 with oval acute serrate leaves, and 3-seeded berry-like fruit. 



3. FRANGTJLA, ALDER-BUCKTHORN. (From frcmgo, to break, the 

 stems brittlej Flowers greenish, generally perfect, and the parts in fives. 

 F. Caroliniana. Wild in wet grounds, from New Jersey and Kentucky 



S. ; a thornless shrub or low tree, with oblong and almost entire rather large 

 leaves ; flowers solitary or in small clusters in the axils, in early summer; the 

 3-seeded fruit black. 



4. CEANOTHUS. (An ancient name, of unknown meaning, applied to 

 these N. American plants.) Flowers in little umbels or fascicles, usually 

 clustered in dense bunches or panicles, handsome, the calyx and even the 

 pedicels colored like the petals and stamens. Ours are low undershrubby 

 plants, with white flowers. In and beyond the Rocky Mountains, especially 

 in California, are manv species, some of them tall shrubs or small trees, 

 loaded with showy blossoms. 



C. Americanus, NEW-JERSEY TEA or RED-ROOT. Wild in dry grounds, 

 l-2 high frum*a dark red root; leaves ovate or oblong ovate, finely serrate, 

 downy beneath, 3-ribbed and veiny, deciduous (used as a substitute for tea in 

 early times, the use lately revived) ; flowers crowded in a dense slender-pedun- 

 cled cluster, in summer. 



C. ovalis. Wild on rocks N from Vermont to Wisconsin : lower than the 



E receding and smoother, with smaller narrow-oval or lance-oblong leaves, and 

 irger flowers on a shorter peduncle, in spring. 



C. microph^llus, SMALL-LEAVED C. Dry barrens S. : low and spread- 

 ing, much branched ; leaves evergreen, very small, obovate, 3-ribbed ; flower- 

 clusters small and simple, in spring. 



34. CELASTRACE^E, STAFF-TREE FAMILY. 



Shrubs, sometimes twining, with simple leaves, minute and decid- 

 uous stipules or none, and small flowers with sepals and petals 

 both imbricated in the bud, and stamens of the number of the latter, 

 alternate with them, and inserted on a disk which fills the bottom 

 of the calyx and often covers the 2-5-celled few-ovuled ovary ; the 

 seeds usually furnished with or enclosed in a fleshy or pulpy aril. 



