CHAPTER XXXVIII 

 SOLANACE^ (Potato Family) 



The potato family is a large one, chiefly tropical; it has 

 about 1, 600 species in 70 genera. A number of these are 

 important medicinal and food plants. Here are included 

 such economic forms as Red or Cayenne pepper, tobacco, 

 common Irish potato, eggplant, tomatoes, belladonna 

 (Alropa belladonna) which furnishes the atropin of commerce, 

 thorn apple {Datura), petunia, etc. 



Habit of Plants. — Representatives of the family are either 

 herbs (potato, tobacco, tomato), shiuhs (Lyciutn spp.), vines 

 {Solanum dulcamara, bittersweet), or trees in some tropical 

 species of Datura. 



Leaves ^ — These are alternate, rarely opposite, without 

 stipules, and entire, toothed, lobed or dissected. 



Inflorescence and Flowers. — The inflorescence is mostly 

 cymose, sometimes imperfectly racemose, umbellate, or 

 paniculate. The flowers (Fig. 232) are regular, or nearly so, 

 perfect, and vary in color. The calyx is inferior, and usually 

 with five united lobes. The corolla is sympetalous, mostly 

 five-lobed. The corolla varies considerably in shape: rotate 

 (tomato), bell-shaped (Physalis), funnel-form {Lyciutn vul- 

 gare), salver-form or tubular (Petunia spp.) There are as 

 many stamens as corolla lobes, alternate with them, and 

 inserted on the tube; in most genera, the stamens are all 

 equal and bear perfect anthers, but in Petunia, for example, 

 there are four perfect stamens, the fifth being very much 

 reduced or entirely absent; the anthers are two-celled, dehis- 



SS9 



