268 MANUAL OF BOTANY 



simple, exstipulate. Flowers usually dioecious. Sepals, petals, 

 stamens, and carpels with a ternary arrangement, hypogynous. 

 Carpels distinct. Fruits 1 -celled, curved. Seed solitary, curved ; 

 embryo curved ; albumen absent, or usually small in amount, 

 and then either homogeneous or somewhat ruminated. 



Distribution and Numbers. — The plants of this order are 

 chiefly foTmd in the forests of the tropical parts of Asia and 

 America. None occur in Europe. IlUisfrative Genera : — Jateo- 

 rhiza, Miers ; Menispermum, Tourn. There are 38 genera and 

 fewer than 100 species included in this order. 



Properties and Uses. — These plants are chiefly remarkable 

 for their narcotic and bitter properties. A few are mucilaginous. 

 ^Tien the narcotic principle is in excess they are very poisonous. 

 Some are valuable tonics. 



Order 52. BerbehidacejB, the Barberry Order. — Charac- 

 ter. — Herbs, undershrubs or shrubs, often climbing (in Lardiza- 

 baleae). Leaves alternate or radical, sometimes simple, some- 

 times pinnate or palmate, sometimes reduced to spines, usually 

 exstipulate. Flowers regular, hermaphrodite, or unisexual, 

 solitary axillary, or in spikes, racemes, panicles, or cymes. 

 Sepals deciduous, in 1 — oo whorls of 2 or 3 each, often petaloid ; 

 pictals equal in number to the sepals and opposite to them, or 

 twice as many, hypogynous. Stamens in 1 — 3 series, opposite 

 to the petals, generally free, but monadelphous in some 

 Lardizabaleae ; hypogynous. Anthers dehiscing longitudinally 

 or by recurved valves. Carpels 1 or 3, distinct ; ovules anatro- 

 pous, attached to a marginal placenta, or scattered over the 

 surface of the ovary wall. Fruit baccate, or dry and follicular ; 

 seeds albuminous. 



The order is divided into two tribes as follows : — 



Tribe 1. Lardizahalece. Flowers unisexual, anthers dehiscing 

 longitudinally, carpels 3. 



Tribe 2. Berberem. Flowers hermaphrodite ; anthers dehis- 

 cing by recurved valves (except in Podopliijlhim and Nan- 

 dina), carpel solitary. 



Diagnosis. — Leaves alternate, very often spiny. Sepals 3, 4, 

 6, or 00 , deciduous. Petals hypogynous, and opposite to the sepals 

 when equal to them in number. Stamens definite, hypo- 

 gynous, opposite to the petals ; anthers 2-celled, each opening by 

 a recurved valve, except in Tribe 1 and the genera Podophyllum 

 and Nandina, where they dehisce longitudinally. Carpel solitary ; 

 placenta marginal ; ovules anatropous. Seeds with albumen. 



