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Elementary Botany 



CALYCIFLORAL ORDERS. 



LEGUMINOS^. 

 Typical plant, Sweet-pea {Lathy rus odoratus, fig. 93 . 

 Note, the plant is herbaceous (in the order there are also 

 shrubs and trees) ; leaves alternate, stipulate, often compound 



and pinnate, as in this case ; 

 calyx gamosepalous, with five 

 teeth ; corolla papiliona- 

 ceous; stamens ten, diadel- 

 phoiis (in several genera they 

 are monadelphous) ; pistil 

 tnonocarpellary ; fruit a le- 

 gume. 



There are three sub-orders 

 of this important order. All 

 the British plants, however, 

 belong to one of these, the 

 PapilionacecB, which is dis- 

 tinguished by having papilio- 

 naceous flowers, and hence 

 can be easily recognised. 

 In the other two sub-orders, which are exclusively extra- 

 European, the flowers are regular, the petals being imbricated 

 in the Casalpinece, and valvate in the Mimosem (fig. 298). The 

 order is a very large one and widely distributed, very varied in 

 its properties, some of the plants being most useful as food 

 and fodder plants, others as drugs, whilst others again are 

 poisonous. 



Principal British Plants. 



Astragalus, Milk Vetch. Leaves imparipinnate ; stamens 

 diadelphous ; keel of corolla blunt ; legume not jointed, but 

 more or less divided into two cells by a partition. A good 

 fodder plant. 



Genista, Greenweed and Dyer's-weed. Leaves simple; 

 stamens monadelphous ; calyx bilabiate. The Dyer's-weed 

 ((?. tinctoria) yields a yellow dye. 



Fig. 298.— Sensitive Plant {Mimosa pttdica). 



