HAMAMELACE^I AND UMBELLIFERiE. 131 



2. P. coronarius, L. False Syringa. 



Leaves orate, sub-dentate, smooth. Style distinct. Cultivated. Native of South 

 Europe. Stems 4 to C feet high with opposite reddish twigs hearing kafy clusters 

 of numerous fragrant showy white flowers. 



Order 50. HAMAMELACEJE. 



Shrubs teith alternate simple leaves, the i-cleft calyx cohering with the base of tkt 

 ovary. Petals 4 to 5, linear. Stamess 4 to 24, inserted on the calyx ; ovary con- 

 sisting of 2 pistils united at the base, forming a 2-beaked woody capsule opening 

 at the summit, 2-celled below, with a single pendulous bony 6eed in each cell. 



HAMAMELIS. Linn. 



Origin of the name uncertain. 



Calyx 4-leaved or cleft, with 2. or 3 bractlets at its base. 

 Petals 4, long, linear. Stamens 8, very short; the 4 

 alternate with the petals fertile, the other imperfect and 

 scale-like. Styles 2, short. Capsule nut-like, 2-celled, 

 2-beaked. — Shrubs or small trees, with short-jyetioled straiglti- 

 veined leaves, and yellow flowers. 



H. Virginica, L. Witch Hazel. 



Leaves obovate or oval, with wavy-toothed margins, downy when young, on 

 short petioles; flowers sessile, 3 or 4 together. 



Damp woods ; common. A large shrub consisting of several crooked branching 

 trunks from the same root, 6 to 12 feet high, flowering in Oct. and Nov. Leant* 

 nearly smooth, obliquely cordate at base. 3 to 5 inches long, 2 to 3 wide, on petioles 

 % inch long. Calyx downy. Petals yellow, curled or twisted. Capsule woody, 

 containing 2 nuts. 



Order 51. UMBELLIFERIE.— Parsley Family. 



Herbaceous plants with hollow stems, alternate, mostly compound leaves, petiole* 

 ecepan<Ied or sheathing at the base. Flowers in umbels, the calyx entirely adherent 

 to tho ovary, the 5 petals and 5 stamens inserted on the disk that crowns th« 

 ovary and surrounds the base of the 2 styles. Fruit consisting of 2 coherent car- 

 pels separating from each other by their faees (commissure) into 2 halves called 

 meroearpg. Seeds solitary and suspended from the summit of each ceU, anatro- 

 pons, with a minute embryo. 



Sub-order I. ORTHOSPERM^B. 



Inner face of the seed flat or nearly so (not excavated). 



1. HYDROCOTYLE. Tourn. Marsh Penny-wort. 



Or. kuder, water, and kotile, a broad or flat cup; in allusion to the loaves of Beam 

 of the species. 



Calyx-teeth obsolete, Petals equal, ovate, spreading, 



