DIADELPHIA— DECANDRIA. Spartium. 261 

 352. SPARTIUM. Broom. 



Linn. Gen. 368. FL Br. 753. Gcertn. t. 153. 

 Genista. J?«s. 353. Lam.t.Q\9.f.\. Tourn.t. 411. 



Cal. cup-shaped, two-lipped ; lips coloured, abrupt ; the 

 upper with 2, lower with 3, very slight teeth. Co7\ of 5 

 petals ; standard inversely heart-shaped, very large, en- 

 tirely reflexed ; wings ovate-oblong, shorter than the 

 standard, connected below with the filaments ; keel of 2 

 petals, lanceolate, oblong, abrupt, longer than the wings, 

 attached to the filaments, and connected together at the 

 lower edges by entangled hairs. Filam. 10, all united 

 into one undivided tube, sometimes slit along the upper 

 side, unequal, thread-shaped, the lowermost gradually 

 longest. Anth. versatile, oblong. Germ, oblong, com- 

 pressed, hairy. Style awl-shaped, curved, or contorted, 

 upwards. Stigma oblong, hairy, running along the upper 

 edge of the blunt style. Legume much compressed, ob- 

 long, obtuse, of 2 elastic valves and 1 cell, subtended by 

 the permanent calyx, and tipped with the twisted style, 

 which is at length deciduous. Seeds several, roundish- 

 kidney-shaped, crested. 



Branched, often thorny, shrubs, with ternate, sometimes 

 partly simple, smallish leaves, and large, handsome, yel- 

 low Jlotvers, on lateral simple stalks. Legumes pendulous. 

 Seeds from 4 to about 15. 



Lamarck has suggested that Spartium of Linnaeus is not 

 generically distinct from Genista, and he united them in 

 his Flore Fraiifoise 614, only referring a few species of 

 each tt) Cytisus. Jussieu avowedly follows him, not with- 

 out some doubts, and a suggestion that the single-seeded 

 species might properly form a genus by themselves, after 

 the opinion of Tournefort, who restricted the name of 

 Spartium to these only. I would rather take as the type 

 of this genus our S. scoparium, and some other species 

 which, along with it, make a very natural genus, in cha- 

 racter and habit, and from which Linnaeus drew up his 

 generic description. These are clearly distinct from Ge- 

 7iista, whatever may be thought of the rest. Those who 

 have studied this natural order well know the importance 

 of the stigma and the legume in their generic distinctions. 



1. S. scoparium. Common Broom. 



Leaves ternate, or solitary. Branches angular, without 



