CARYOPHYLLACE.E. (PINK FAMILY.) 31 



Order 10. FttANKENIACE^. 



Low perennial herbs or undershrubs, with opposite entire Reaves and 

 no stipules ; distinguished from Silenece mainly by the parietal placentae 

 and oval or oblong anatropous seeds with a straight embryo. 



1. PRANKENIA, L. 



Calyx tubular or prismatic, 4 or 5-lobed. Petals 4 or 5, clawed and bear- 

 ing a crown. Stamens 6. Ovary 1-celled : style 2 to 4-cleft into filiform 

 divisions. Capsule included in the persistent calyx. — Leaves small, mostly 

 crowded, and also fascicled in the axils : flowers small, solitary and sessile in 

 the forks of the stem or becoming cymose-clustered on the branches, white. 



1. P. Jamesii, Torr. Much branched from a woody base, 6 to 10 inches 

 high : leaves linear, strongly revolute on the margins, the fascicled ones 

 shorter : limb of petals erose-denticulate at tip. — S. Colorado. 



Order 11. CARYOPHYLLACE^. (Pink Family.) 



Herbs, with regular and mostly perfect flowers, 4 or 5 persistent 

 sepals, 4 or 5 petals (sometimes wanting), the distinct stamens com- 

 monly twice as many, ovary one-celled with a free central placenta, the 

 seeds reniform. — Stems usually swollen at the nodes. Leaves opposite. 

 Styles 2 to 5, mostly distinct. Fruit a capsule opening by valves, or by 

 teeth at the summit. Stipules none in our genera. 



Tribe I. Sepals united. Petals with a conspicuous claw, usually with an appendage 

 (crown) at the base of the blade, borne with the stamens on a stipe under the ovary. 

 Capsule dehiscent at the toothed summit. Flowers comparatively lar^e. Silenece.* 



1. Silene. Calyx 5-toothed. Styles 3. 



2. Lychnis. Calyx 5-toothed or 5-lobed. Styles 4 or 5. 



Tribe II. Sepals distinct or nearly so. Petals without crown or distinct claw, inserted 

 with the stamens on the margin of a disk under the sessile ovary, sometimes incon- 

 spicuous or wanting. — Alsine^e. 



* Styles (when of the same number) opposite the sepals. 



3. Cerastium. Capsule cylindric, opening at the toothed apex. Petals emarginate or 



bifid. Styles usually 5. 



4. Stellaria. Capsule short, splitting to the base. Petals 2-oleft or none. Styles mostly 3. 



5. Arenaria. Differs from the last chiefly in the entire petals, these rarely wanting. 



* * Styles alternate with the sepals and of the same number. 



6. Sagina. Capsule 4 or 5-valved. Petals entire or wanting. Styles 4 or 5- 



1. SILENE, L. Catchfly. 



Calyx tubular, 10-nerved. Petals entire, notched, or bifid. Capsule usually 

 6-toothed. — Annual or mostly perennial herbs. 



1 Saponaria, an introduced genus, has a terete calyx, petals not crowned, and two styles. 

 S. Vaccaria, L., is a smooth annual, with ovate-lanceolate leaves, pale red flowers in cor- 

 ymbed cymes, and calyx enlarged and wing-angled in fruit. — Vaccaria vulgaris of Gray's 

 Manual Very generally introduced. 



