Family 1. RUBIACEAE* 
By Paul CARPENTER STANDLEY 
Herbs, shrubs, or trees, sometimes scandent, the branchlets often spines- 
cent. Leaves opposite or verticillate, very rarely alternate, stipulate, the 
blades simple, entire or rarely lobate or dentate. Stipules adnate to the stem 
between the leaves, persistent or deciduous, often confluent into a sheath, 
entire, dentate, or setiferous, rarely foliaceous, in one tribe (Galzeae) resembling 
the leaves. Inflorescence various, usually cymose, occasionally capitate, the 
hypanthia sometimes adnate and forming asyncarp. Flowers perfect or rarely 
unisexual, usually regular and symmetric, frequently dimorphous. Hypan- 
thium adnate to the ovary. Calyx cupular or tubular or nearly obsolete, en- 
tire, dentate, or lobate, persistent or deciduous, the lobes often unequal, one or 
more sometimes foliaceous. Corolla gamopetalous and funnelform, salverform, 
campanulate, rotate, or rarely urceolate or tubular, glabrous or pubescent 
within, the limb usually symmetric, the lobes valvate, imbricate, or contorted. 
Stamens usually as many as the corolla-lobes and alternate with them, inserted 
in the tube or throat of the corolla, rarely subbasilar and nearly free; filaments 
short, elongate, or wanting; anthers usually oblong-linear, 2-celled, dehiscent 
by anterior or lateral slits or rarely by pores, dorsifixed or basifixed. Disk 
annular, pulvinar, hemispheric, or conic, rarely lobate or reduced to glands. 
Ovary 1—10-celled; style short or elongate, simple or 2—10-fid, the branches. 
filiform, linear, or spatulate, stigmatose throughout or at the apex, or the stigma 
terminal, and capitate, oblong, or fusiform; placentae affixed to the septum or 
to the interior angle of the cell, or basilar, or pendulous from the apex of the 
cell, simple, bifid, or bilamellate; ovules solitary, geminate, or numerous, 
superficial or immersed in the placentae, erect, horizontal, ascending, or pen- 
dulous, anatropous or amphitropous, the funicle short or wanting. Fruit cap- 
sular, baccate, or drupaceous, or of dehiscent or indehiscent cocci, 2—10-celled, 
or rarely 1-celled. Seeds variable in form and size, naked or immersed in the 
pulp or placentae; testa usually membranaceous or coriaceous, smooth or 
roughened, often winged or appendaged; endosperm fleshy or corneous, very 
rarely wanting; embryo small or large, straight or curved, axial, dorsal, or 
apical; cotyledons plane or semiterete; radicle terete or clavellate, superior 
or inferior. 
Ovules more than one in each cell. 
Fruit dry. 
Flowers not arranged in compact globose heads. 
Seeds exalate, or, if winged, horizontal. 
Corolla-lobes valvate. 
Seeds horizontal, usually very numerous; stipules en- 
tire or bipartite; large shrubs or trees with usually 
large leaves. I. CONDAMINEEAE. 
* Published by permission of the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. 
VOLUME 32, ParRT 1, 1918] 3 
