270 WEEDS AND USEFUL PLANTS. 
Orper LVI. PHYTOLACCA’CEA. (PoxkEwrep aD 
Herbs 0 oF edge ee3 plants, having alternate | entire on Sears Rao a ee 
—5 petaloid slightly with as r tw: 
or sometimes indefinite. Ovary compound “arely simple), consisting of "10 condinded 
1-ovuled carpels ; styles or stigmas distinct. Fruit baccate ; embryo curved round mealy 
A oxtail Order, and of little interest in Agriculture. 
1. PHYTOLAO’CA, Tournef. Poxeweep. 
[Gr. Phyton, a plant, and Lachanon, a pot-herb ; the young shoots being so used.] 
Flowers geet Calyx of five sg deme aie Fi eabaian 
sepals. Stamens 5-30. Ovary free, c mposed of 5—12 ca united 
in a ring, with as man short pecngaling styles, in fruit fete a de- 
obose 5—12-celled berry with a single vertical seed in each cell. 
1. P. decan’dra, L. Stout; smooth and often purple; leaves ovate 
oblong ; berries 10-celled, juicy, dark-purple. 
Decanprovus Puyrotacca. Poke. Poke-weed. Pigeon-berry. Garget. 
Fy. Morelle & Grappes. Germ. Kermesbeere. Span. Yerba carmin. 
Root perennial, large, fusiform and branching. Stem herbaceous, 4-6 feet high, stou! 
oe Bede te or obtusely ee below the petioles and pranen, ‘nally ‘rte 
Leaves 5-10 inches long, acute or acuminate, thin ; petioles half ai nch to 2 inches or 
more in le linet. acemes 3-6 inches long, simple, mostly opposite coy leaves, pine 
meles 2~4 inches long. Sepals white , membranaceous at the margin. Berries verti- 
cally depressed, bm oni orbicular, obseur rely ee 10-celled, 10-seeded, dark pur- 
ple ney juicy w mature. compres sed, row ish-reniform 
Rich soils ; on bas, borders. sa fields, in clearings : throughout the United States. 
Fil, June- -Septemb: er. Fr. August —Oct ober 
Obs. The young : — of this plant afford a good substitute for on 
paragus ; the root is said to be oe emetic ; and the tincture o 
— es 18, Or fr a popular remedy for chronic rheumatism. The 
ies, moreover, have been used by the pastry cook in making 
pis a 9 5 tom merit. Notwithstanding all this, the plant is regarded 
a weed by all neat farmers 
Orper LVIII. CHENOPODIA’CEA. (Gooszroor Famty.) — 
Chiefly coarse weed- = herbs, with meeny alternate, sees. or less me teany leaves, without 
: minute ,greenish, without scarious n dicecious or polygamous ; 
calyx free from the ovary, 2- 5-lo bed, greet ted in ine bud, persistent, embracing the 
fruit ; stamens usually as many as the ca alyx-lobes, al opposite the’ 
becoming a thin 1-seeded uéricle, or rarely —- ; embryo (in the genera noticed 
here) coiled in a ring around the mealy album 
§ 1. Flowers mostly fonts or aor poly; amous by the want of stamens in some of 
Calyx 3- 5-cleft, or parted, the lobes merely oe in fruit. Seed horizontal (rarely 
vertic al whet the calyx is only 2—3-cleft). j, CHenopopiumM. 
Calyx Spee Age: base indurated and corky in fruit.. Seed horizontal. 
pepe, dry or juicy in fruit. Utricle membranaceous. © 
of fertile resto! inflated-tubular, unequally 2~4-toothed. 
