CUCURBITACB* (GOUED FAMILY.) 139 



ovule: style slender: stigmas 3. Fruit ovate, dry and indehiscent, filled by 

 the single seed, covered with barbed prickly bristles which are readily detached. 



— Climbing annuals, with small whitish flowers ; the sterile and fertile mostly 

 from the same axils, the former coiymbed, the latter in a capitate cluster, long- 

 peduneled. (The Greek name for the Cucumber.) 



1. S. ang'UlatllS, L. Leaves roundish-heart-shaped and 5-angled or 

 lobed, the lobes pointed ; plant beset with clammy hairs. — River-banks. July- 

 Sept. 



a. ECHINOCi-STIS, Torr. &Gray. Wild Balsam-apple. 



Flowers nionoecious. Petals 6, lanceolate, united at the base into an open 

 spreading corolla. Stamens 3, separable into 2 sets. Ovary 2-celled, with 2 

 erect ovules in each cell : stigma bioad. Fruit large, ovoid, fleshy, at length 

 dry, clothed with weak prickles, bursting at the summit, 2-celIed, 4-seeded, the 

 inner part fibrous-netted. Seeds lai;ge, obovate-oblong. — An annual, rank, and 

 tall-climbing plant, nearly smooth, with deeply and sharply 5-lobed thin leaves, 

 and very numerous small greenish-white flowers; the sterile in compound ra- 

 cemes often 1° long, the fruitful in small clusters or solitary, from the same 

 axils. (Name composed of excvos, a hedgehog, and kuotie, u, bladder, from the 

 prickly covering of the at length bladdery fruit.) 



1. E. lobata, Torr. & Gr. {Sicjoa, Michx. MoTa6rAicaecUnkta,,Mahl.) 



— Rich soil along rivers, W. New England to Wisconsin and Kentucky. July- 

 Oct. — Fruit 2' long. 



3. MELiOTIIRIA, L. Melotheia. 



Flowers polygamous or monoecious ; the sterile campanulate, the corolla 5- 

 lobed ; the fertile with the calyx-tube constricted above the ovary, then campan- 

 ulate. Anthers 3 or 5, more or less united. Berry fleshy, filled with many flat 

 and horizontal seeds. — Tendrils simple. Flowers very small. (Altered from 

 M^\a6pov, an ancient name for a sort of white grape.) 



1. ]fl. pendula, L. Slender, climbing ; leaves small, roundish and 

 heart-shaped, 5-angled or lobed, ronghish ; sterile flowers few in small racemes ; 

 the fertile solitary, gi*eenish, or yellowish; berry oval (J'-l' long), gi-een. 1|. 



— Copses, Virginia and southward. June - Aug. 



CtJCUMis SATivus, the Cccumbeb; C. MiiLO, the Mcskmelon, C. Ci- 

 tbi5llds, the Watekmelon ; CucCrbita Piipo, the Pdmpkiit, C. Melo- 

 rkro, the Round Squash ; C. vekeuc6sa, the Long Squash ; C. aurAn- 

 TIA, the Orange Gourd ; and LagenIeia vuLGiEis, the Bottle Gourd, 

 are the most familiar cultivated representatives of this family. 



Ordek 49. CRASSULiACEJE. (Orpine Family.) 



Succulent herbs, vjith perfectly symmetrical flowers ; mz. the petals and 

 pistils equalling the sepals in number (3-20), and the stamens the same or 

 double their number. — SepaJs persistent, more or less united at the base. 



