272 THE STELLATE TEIBE. 



long. Flowers of a pale-yellowish, white, dowuy aud scentless, only 4 or 

 5 Imes long, hanging two together from short axillary peduncles, with two 

 small narrow bracts close under them. Berries bright scarlet, with 2 or 3 

 seeds in each. 



In tliickets and hedges, almost all over Europe and Eussian Asia, extend- 

 ing northward to the Arctic Circle. Dispersed over various parts of Britain, 

 generally introduced from cultivation, but believed to be really indigenous 

 in some parts of south-eastern England. It is very common in om- slu-ub- 

 beries. Fl. early summer. 



V. LINNiEA. LINN^A. 



Calyx with a border of 5 teeth. Corolla campanulate, 5-lobed, narrowed 

 at the base into a short tube. Stamens 4. 



A genus of a single species, dethcated to the great master of natural 

 science, with whom it was an especial favom-ite. 



1. Northern Iiinnsea. Iiinnseaborealis, Grouov. 

 (Eng. Bot. t. 433.) 



A slender evergi-een, creeping and tracing along the ground to the length 

 of a foot or more. Leaves opposite, small, broadly ovate or obovate, and 

 slightly toothed at the top. Flowering branches short and erect, with 2 or 

 3 pafrs of leaves, and terminated by a long slender peduncle, branched near 

 the top into 2 pedicels, each bearing an elegant, gracefidly drooping, and 

 fragrant flower of a pale pink or white colour, about 5 lines long. Ovary 

 globular and very hairy, tlie rest of the plant more or less covered with a 

 very minute glandular down, or sometimes quite glabrous. 



In woods, or rarely in more open rocky situations, in northern Europe and 

 Asia and some parts of North America, reappearing in the mountain dis- 

 tricts of central Europe even on the southern side of the Alps. In Britain 

 confined to the fii--woods of some of the eastern counties iu Scotland, aud to 

 a single locality in Northumberland. Fl. summer. 



XXXIX. THE STELLATE TRIBE. STELLATE. 



(A Tribe of the Hadder family or Rubiacece.) 



Herbs, with angular stems, aud entire leaves in whorls of 4, 

 6, or 8 (that is, apparently so, for two opposite ones only of 

 each whorl are real leaves with huds in their axils, the others, 

 although precisely similar, are in fact stipules), rarely 2 only, 

 the buds and branches always opposite. Flowers small, in ter- 

 minal or rarely axillary panicles or heads. Calyx combined 

 with the ovary, either entirely so or rarely with a border of 4 

 or 5 teeth. Corolla monopetalous, with 4 or 5 spreading lobes. 

 (Stamens as many, inserted iu the tube. Ovary inferior. Style 

 2-cleft at the top, with a capitate stigma to each branch. Fruit 

 iudehiscent, small, dry or rarely succtilent, usually separating 

 into 2 seed-like carpels with one seed iu each. Albumen horny, 

 with a small embryo. 



