EUPHORBIACEAE (SPURGE FAMILY) 271 
shaped, and to add to their oddity are blotched with deep red. 
The involucres are in terminal clusters, each on a peduncle of about 
its own length, with five much incised, ovate lobes, bearing usually 
one, occasionally several, cup-shaped glands, which are sessile or 
nearly so, and without appendages. Seeds nearly globular, 
roughened with small tubercles. 
Means of control 
If not too numerous, the plants are best destroyed by hand- » 
pulling as soon as observed ; or by cutting so closely and frequently 
that no seed will be allowed to mature. 
LEAFY SPURGE 
Euphérbia Esula, L 
Other English ngmes: Tithymal, Faitour’s Grags. 
Introduced. Perennial. Propagates by seeds and by rootstocks. 
Time of bloom: June to August. 
Seed-time: July to October. 
. Range: Southern Maine to New Jersey, westward to Michigan. 
Habitat: Roadsides, waste places. 
Not a common weed in this country as yet, and should 
not be permitted to become so, for its creeping, horizontal 
rootstocks make it difficult to dislodge when once established ; 
like the Cypress Spurge it grows in patches, smothering all 
weaker growths in its way. 
Stems thickly clustered, ten inches to two feet tall, erect, slender, 
scaly at base, smooth above, branching near the top. Leaves 
narrowly oblong to lance-shape, a half-inch to nearly two inches in 
length, entire, sessile, whorled at the base of the umbel, few and 
scattering on the stalk. Umbel compound, its many rays fork- 
branched and bearing numerous opposite, greenish yellow bracts, 
broadly heart-shaped, with midvein extended in a minute bristle ; 
involucres bell-shaped, nearly sessile, bearing four unappendaged, 
crescent-shaped brown glands. Capsule smooth, nodding on a 
long stipe; the seeds drab-gray, oblong, round and smooth, car- 
uncled at base. 
