I RANUNCVLACEJE. 



(RANUNCtTLACE^, /wssieM,— P^ONIACE^ AND RANUNCULACEiE, BaHlmg.) 



Calyx polysepalaus. Coeolla polypetalous, hypogynous, regular or irregular, im- 

 bricate, sometimes 0. Stamens numerous. Anthees adnaie. Caepbls usually dis- 

 tinct. Y'&vvs an achene or follicle, rarely a capsule or lerry. Seeds erect, pendulous, 

 or horizontal. Embeto dicotyledonous, minute, at the tase of a usually homy 

 albumen. 



Heebs, rarely sheubs {Pceonia Moutan), or woody climbers (Clematis). Leaves 

 radical or alternate, rarely opposite {Clematis}, simple or compound, petiole often 

 dilated, amplexicaul, or rarely furnished with stipuliforra appendages [Thalictrum, 

 Ranunculus). Flowees usually terminal, solitary, racemed, or panicled, usually 

 regular, sometimes irregular (Delphinium, Aconitum), ?, or rarely dioecious by sup- 

 pression (Clematis). Sepals 3— oO , usually 5, free, rarely persistent (Helleborus, 

 PcBonia), often petalold, usually imbricate, rarely valvate (Clematis). Petals equal 

 and alternate with the sepals, or more (JFicaria, Oxygraphis, &c.), hypogynous, free, 

 clawed, imbricate, deciduous, equal or unequal, various in form, often 0. Stamens 

 usually many, many-seriate, hypogynotis ; filaments filiform, free ; anthers terminal, 

 2-celled, cells adnate, extrorse or lateral. Caepels few or many, rarely solitary 

 (Actoea), free, rarely coherent (Wigella) ; style simple ; stigma on the inner surface of 

 the top of the style, or sessile ; ovules anatropous, sometimes solitary, ascending with 

 a ventral raphe, or pendulous with a dorsal raphe ; sometimes numerous, attached 

 to the ventral suture, 2-seriate and horizontal. Petjit of pointed or feathery 

 achenes, or of follicles, which are rarely united into a capsule (Nigella), or of t-few- 

 seeded berries (ActoeaJ. Seeds erect, pendulous, or horizontal ; testa coriaceous in 

 the achenes, and raphe little prominent ; testa crustaceous land fleshy-fungoid in the 

 follicles, with the raphe very prominent and almost carunculate. Embeto minute at 

 the base of a horny, or rarely fleshy albumen (Pceonia). 



We have illustrated the family of liaiiunculacem in greater detail than the others, in 

 commemoration of the fine work of A. L. de Jussieu, read before the Academie des Sciences, 

 in 1773, which may be regarded as the date of the birth of the Natural System. B. de Jussieu, 

 the uncle of Antoine Laurent, had long studied the relationships existing between the different 

 large groups of the Vegetable Kingdom ; but he did not attempt to estimate the relative value of 

 the characters they presented, contenting himself with arranging in accordance with his views 

 the flower-beds of the garden of the Trianon, which he formed for the instruction of Louis XV. 

 Thirty years later, having become old and infirm, his nephew, Antoine Laurent, was charged 

 with the completion of this garden, and made a special study of Banunculacece, which at once 

 revealed to him the scientific basis of his uncle's classification. He could not have chosen a 

 more instructive family in a philosophical point of view, because of the numerous anomalies it 



