Ord. OXALIDACEiE. 



Herbas, rarissime arbores, succo acidulo, foliis altcrnis di- 

 gitatis pinnatisve, foliolis sa^piiis obcordatis : dicotylcdoneir, 

 hypogynae, symmetricoB, 5-merae, 10-andras, regulares ; assti- 

 vatione calycis persistentis imbricativa, corollae convolutiva ; 

 staminibus pi. m. monadelphis ; ovario 5-lociilari ; stylis dis- 

 cretis ; fructu capsulari seu baccato ; seminibus anatropis 

 pendulis, testa arilliformi ; embryone in axi albuminis parci 

 rectus, cotyledonibus planis. 



OxALiDE^, DC. Prodr. 1. p. 689. Bartl. Ord. Nat. p. 351. Melsn. P!. 



Vase. p. 57. Endl. Gen. p. 1171. 

 OxALiDACE^:, Lindl. Introd. Nat. Syst. ed. 2. p. 140, & Vcg. Kingd. p. 



488, excl. gen. 



The Wood-Sorrel F.\mily consists of the large genus Oxalis, which is 

 ■widely diffused through the temperate and warmer parts of the world, with 

 Averrhoa, L., an Indian genus of trees with baccate fruit. These plants 

 are distinguished from the related families (namely, from the preceding and 

 the two succeeding) by their sour juice ; their alternate and compound leaves ; 

 their regular perfectly symmetrical and decandrous flowers with more or less 

 monadelphous stamens ; their capsular or baccate fruit with no central axis 

 produced into a beak, and no dorsal partitions; and the aril-like oxteriinl 

 integument of their seeds, with a large and straight embryo in the axi.^ (if 

 sparing albumen. 



The leaves close at nightfell, like those of the Mimoseae, and arc not 

 unfrequenlly sensitive to the touch, especially in the pinnated species of 

 Oxalis, to which De Candolle, on this account, applied the name of Bio- 

 phytum. 



The acidity, which is the only marked property of these plants, is owing 

 to oxalic acid (in the form of binoxalate of potash), which is formed in the 

 herbage ; so largely in Oxalis Acetosella, that five hundred pounds of the 

 fresh plant are said to yield four pounds of the pure salt. The baccate 

 fruit of Averrhoa, also, is extremely sour ; it is used for pickles in the East 

 Indies, and a less acid cultivated form is an article of food. Several Amer- 

 ican species of Oxalis Itear edililc tubm's. " O. crcnatn. found in Cnldinhia. 



