UMBELLIFERM. 



107 



Meum (Liffusticum) alatum. 



face. The vittse are indefinite in number. The involucres are nil 

 or reduced to a small number of bracts, and the bracteoles of the 

 involucel are variable, often inconsiderable, in number, and narrow, 

 setaceous. To this genus as sections we refer : Bonannia, whose 

 fruit, rather more compressed, has seeds with flat face, vittse indefinite 

 in number, often slightly marked, and whose involucres and involucels 

 are formed of short bracts ; Silaus, having the fruit of Meum atha-. 

 manticum, with indistinct vittse, very fine, or very wide, though 

 very thin on the facial 

 side, involucres and in- 

 volucels similar to those 

 of Meum ; Ligusticum 

 (fig. 102) whose vittse 

 are numerous, sometimes 

 indistinct, and whose 

 fruit has a flat or slightly 

 concave face; Schultzia, 

 having the fruit oiLiguS' 

 ticwm with well deve- 

 loped involucres and 

 involucels of entire or 

 divided bracts ; Siler, 

 whose fruit similar to 

 that of Ligusticum, has 

 solitary vittse ; the invo- 

 lucres and involucels are 

 similar to those of Meum ; 



Pleurospermum, whose vittse are solitary or geminate, and whose 

 seeds have a flat or more or less concave face ; the bracts of the 

 involucre and involucels are entire or divided, nearly hke those of 

 Schultzia; Gyathoselinwrn^ having the fruit of Ligusticum, but the 

 b;racts of the involucel united at the base, as in certain Seseli ; 

 Trochiscanthes, whose fruit is that of Meum, with numerous vittse, 

 but the umbels are united in a sort of ramified and verticillate cluster ; 

 the petals have an elongate claw ; finally Selinum and Cortia, having 

 the fruit of Meum or Ligusticum, rather short, soUtary vittse in each 

 furrow, and marginal ridges developed into rather wider wings. In 

 Cortia, Indian herbs, having the latero-dorsal ridges more developed 



Fig. 102. Trans, sect, of fruit (i,°). 



