146 



KEY AND FLORA 



or twice as many. Fruit a 3-lobed capsule. Seeds containing 

 fleshy or oily endosperm. Most of the family are natives of 

 hot regions, many of them of peculiar aspect fi-om their adap- 

 tation to life in dry climates. [The family is too difficult for 

 the beginner in botany to determine many of its genera and 

 species with certainty, but a few are described below.j 



I. JATROPHA L. 



Shrubs or herbs. Leaves alternate. Flowers monoecious, 

 staminate and pistillate intermixed in the cymes, apetalous. 

 Calyx large, white, 5-lobed, corolla-like. Stamens numerous, 

 usually monadelphous. Ovary usually 3-celled, 3-seeded ; styles 

 3, united at the base, several-parted.* 



1. J. stimulosa Michx. Spurge Nettle. Perennial herbs armed 

 with stinging hairs ; stems erect, branched, bright green with white 

 lines, 8-15 in. high. Leaves long-petioled, deeply i^almately 3-5- 

 lobed, the lobes irregularly cut and toothed, often mottled. Sepals 

 white, spreading. Seeds oblong, smooth, mottled. In dry woods S.* 



Fig. 23. Euphorbia corollata 



A, flower cluster with involucre, the whole ajipearing like a single flower. 

 B, a single staminate flower: a, anther. C, fertile flower, as seen after 

 the removal of the sterile flowers. D, partly matured fruit : i, involucre ; 

 s, stigmas ; c, capsule 



II. EUPHORBIA L. 



Herbs or shrubs, with milky juice, often poisonous. Flowers 

 monoecious, inclosed in a 4-5-lobed involucre, which is often 

 showy and resembles a calyx or corolla, usually bearing large 



