84 ENGLISH BOTANY. 
ORDER LXIV—THYMELACES. 
Shrubs or small trees, very rarely annual herbs, with the leaves 
alternate or opposite, simple and entire, not dotted. Stipules none. 
Flowers perfect or diccious, usually regular, in terminal heads or 
spikes or in lateral clusters, rarely solitary, often enclosed by an inyo- 
lucre. Perianth single, usually coloured, rarely herbaceous, tubular 
or funnelshaped or salvershaped; tube free from the ovary; limb 4-, 
rarely 5-cleft; segments with imbricated cestivation. Petals absent 
or represented by scales inserted in the throat of the calyx. Stamens 
definite, usually 8 or 10, rarely 4 or 2, inserted on the tube or throat 
of the perianth; anthers 2-celled, opening longitudinally. Ovary 
solitary, free from the perianth, 1-celled; ovule 1, very rarely 2 or 3, 
and superimposed, pendulous, anatropous; style 1, sometimes very 
short; stigma undivided. Fruit a nut or drupe. Seed solitary, with 
a thin testa; albumen generally none, or, if present, in small quan- 
tity, and fleshy; embryo straight; cotyledons fleshy; radicle superior. 
GENUS I—DAPHNE. Linn. 
Flowers perfect. Perianth withering and deciduous, coloured, 
salvershaped or salvershaped-funnelshaped ; limb 4-cleft, spreading 
or ascending, without scales in the throat. Stamens 8, inserted in 
2 rows in the upper part of the perianth-tube, included. Style sub- 
lateral, very short. Fruit drupaceous, containing a 1-seeded stone. 
Small shrubs, rarely trees, with the leaves entire, alternate, very rarely 
opposite. Stipules none. Flowers lateral or terminal, often fragrant. 
The derivation of the name of this genus of plants is asserted by Lindley, and some 
other botanists, to have been from the Greek name of the Ruscus racemosus, or Alex- 
andrian laurel, into which it is fabled that Daphne was changed. It is stated in Rees’ 
Cyclopedia that Laurus nobilis “is certainly the Daphne of Dioscorides, and conse- 
quently the classical laurel.” It is still called by the same name among the modern 
Greeks; this is also the popular belief. 
SPECIES I—-DAPHNE MEZEREUM. Lin. 
Pirate MCCXLVL. 
Reich. Fl. Germ. et Helv. Vol. XI. Tab. DLVI. Fig. 1181. 
Pillot, F\. Gall. et Germ. Exsice. No. 1546. 
Stem erect, branched. Leaves oblanceolate, thin, deciduous. Flowers 
appearing before the leaves, in lateral clusters arranged in spikes below 
the apex of the branches, which afterwards produce terminal rosettes 
