414 CHENOPODiACE^. [Schoheiiu- 



Herb very pricltly and bushy, of a pale pellucid rather glaucous-green, brittle 

 and succulent. Root, though annual, very hard, tough and woody, with fibres 

 running far and wide iu the loose sand. Stems numerous, in the small plants 

 prostrate, much branched from the base, from a few inches to a foot or more, 

 spreading in all directions, the central ones in large plants upright, the rest 

 ascending or decumbent, rounded, bluntly angular and furrowed, striped with red 

 and green or white and green, rough with short pellucid bristles, and filled inter- 

 nally with very loose white cellular tissue of great delicacy. Leaves numerous, 

 awl-shaped, very succulent, scabroso-puuctate, nearly cylindrical, obtuse, tipped 

 with a short spine, their bases 3-nerved, compressed and dilated into a white 

 membranous border, beset with small spines running to some distance along the 

 leaf towards its point : as they ascend, the leaves become shorter, broader, with 

 wider scariose edges, the uppermost nearly triangular. Flowers solitary and ses- 

 sile in the axils of almost every leaf and at the foot of the short lateral shoots 

 springing from them, and also floviferous, each seated between two bracts like the 

 leaves themselves, but smaller. Segments of the perianth at first erect, ovato-lan- 

 ceolate, scariose and acute, whitish or pale rose-colour; after flowering they 

 become cartilaginous and enlarged, lying over and closely investing the seed. 

 Stamens erect, inserted at the base of the germen and opposite to the segments of 

 the perianth, with a greenish gland between edch filament ; anthers ovato-oblong, 

 pale yellow. Styles combined for some distance upwards, 2 or 3, or rather there 

 is but 1 style with 2 or 3 stigmas,* which, from their exceeding in length the un- 

 divided portion, have been counted as so many styles, though nothing like a coa- 

 lition of separate parts can be perceived ; stigmas roughish, spreading or recurved ; 

 germen subglobose, finely wrinkled or furrowed. Seed horizontal, depresso-turbinate, 

 quite concealed by the connivent calyx-sepals, the points of which meet around 

 and enclose the persistent style, and are at this period in many, though not in all, 

 of the flowers furnished with membranous, flat and spreading prolongations of 

 their substance at the margin formed by the inflexion of their apices, various in 

 form and size, and have been justly observed as often wanting as present on the 

 same plant, or but partially developed. 



Tribe II. SvjEde^. 



" Seed ivith a double integument. Embryo in aflat spiral. Stem 

 continuous." — Br. Fl. 



II. ScHOBERiA, C. A. Meyer. S«a Elite. 



" Floivers usually perfect, bibracteated at the base. Perianth 

 6 -partite, at length inflated and often fleshy (without appendages 

 or a wing at the back). Stamens 5. Style 0. Stigmas usually 3. 

 Utricle covered by the perianth. Seed lenticular; integument 

 double, outer one crustaceous. {Leaves semicylindrical)." — 

 SuiEDA. — Br. Fl. 



1. S. maritlma, Mey. Sea Blite. "Leaves usually acute, 

 styles 2, seeds reticulato-striated horizontal, stem herbaceous 

 diffuse." — Suseda. — Br. Fl. p. 852. Chenopodium, L. : E. B. 

 t. 633. Chenopodiaa, Mog. 



* This is the view taken of our own and of the German species by Mertens 

 and Koch. 



