POINSETTIA 



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This pretty, white-flowered, forking creature is a puzzle for 

 amateurs. Its flower cup is such a perfect corolla, its tiny sta- 

 mens look so natural and law-abiding, the pistil is so evidently 

 in place that the flower has a tendency to deceive even the elect 

 botanist, until the long, thread-like stem that carries the ovary is 

 noted and the puzzle is solved. The infloresence is abundant 

 and borne in loose-flowered umbels, but the milky juice of the 

 stem is an objection, for the garden value of the plant lies in its 

 cut flowers, which, like those of Gypsophila and Galium, are at 

 their best only in combination with others. 



If one wishes to study the curiously abnormal inflorescence of 

 the Euphorbias, it is only necessary to pick up the little, half- 

 prostrate, forking mat that lies in the sand by the roadsides or 

 creeps over the edge of the garden walk and spreads out over the 

 pathway. 3y July the little creeping thing will have flowers in 

 the axil of nearly every leaf, whose tiny globular seed-vessels on 

 stems protruding out from the minute reddish flower will show 

 the family characteristics. For this is Euphorbia maculata, the^ 

 Spotted Spurge, a citizen of the world. Its leaves are small, ob- 

 long, or ovate, obtuse, slightly serrate, oblique at base, and on 

 red, hairy stems are themselves blotched with red. On the sands 

 of the sea-shore or of the Great Lakes one may study Euphorbia 

 polygonifdlia, a very similar plant. 



POINSETTIA 



Eu-phdrhia pulcherrima. 



The most brilliant of the Euphorbias. At the North, grown in-doors 

 and used in Christmas decorations. Native to moist, shaded places of 

 tropical America. 



Stem. — Woody, two to six feet high. 



Leaves. — Ovate-elliptical or lanceolate; entire, sinuate-toothed or 

 lobed; lower leaves green; upper leaves and leaf -like bracts brilliant 

 vermilion-red. 



Flowers. — Euphorbia type, in a loose cyme; involucres greenish with 

 one large yellow gland. 



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