112 RHAMNACEiE. pachystima. 



RHAMNDS. 



- 2 PACHYSTIMA Raf. Am. Month. Mag. 1818. 



Low evergreen shrubs with opposite leaves, and small flowers 

 in 1 -few-flowered axillary cymes. Calyx with a short obconical 

 tube and four rounded lobes. Petals 4. Stamens 4, inserted at 

 the edge of the broad disk which lines the calyx-tube. Ovary 

 free, 2-celled : style very short: capsule 2-valved, 1-2-seeded. 

 Seeds enclosed in a white, many-cleft membranous aril. 



P, Myrsinites Raf. I.e. Densely branched to nearly simple, 1-3 feet 

 high: leaves smooth, ovate to oblong or lanceolate, cuneate at base, the 

 upper half serrate or serrulate, ^-1 in« h long on very short peduncles: 

 flowers a line or two long : fruit 2 lines long, smooth. In the mountains, 

 from Brit, Columbia to California and the Rocky Mountains. 



Order XXII. KHAMNACE^E Dumort, Fl. Belg. 102. 



Trees or shrubs, the branches often thorny. Leaves simple 

 with minute stipules. Flowers small, sometimes by abortion dioe- 

 cious, monoecious or polygamous. Calyx 4-5-cleft, valvate in the 

 bud. Petals distinct, cucullate, (each wrapped around a stamen) 

 narrowed at base, inserted upon the throat of the calyx, some- 

 times wanting. Stamens as many as the lobes of the calyx and 

 alternate with them. Ovary 2-4, united carpels, 2-4-cellecl, free 

 from or usually cohering with the tube of the calyx or more or 

 less immersed in the fleshy perigynous disk : ovules solitary, erect. 

 Styles more or less connate : stigmas simple usually distinct. 

 Fruit free or commonly more or less cohering with the calyx, 

 fleshy and indehiscent or with the carpels dry and at length sep- 

 arable. Seeds erect, anatropous, with a large, straight embryo 

 in sparing fleshy albumen. 



1. Rhamuus. Calyx and disk free from the ovary: calyx-lobes erector 

 spreading: fruit berry-like. 



2. Oauothus. Calyx and disk adnate to the base of the ovary: calyx- 

 lobes connivent. Fruit dry or nearly so. 



1 RHAMNUS L. Gen. n. 265 in part. 



Shrubs or small trees with alternate petioled pinnately veined 

 leaves, small deciduous stipules and axillary cymose or racemose 

 flowers. Flowers perfect or polygamo-diot-cious. Calyx 4-5-cleft, 

 with erect or spreading lobes, the campanulate tube lined with 

 the disk and persistent. Petals 4 or 6 or more, inserted on the 

 margin ol the disk : claws short. Stamens 4 or 5: filaments very 

 short. Ovary free, 2-4-cel led : style short, 3-4-cleft. Fruit bac- 

 cate, containing 2-1 cartilaginous 1-seeded nutlets, mostly inde- 

 hiscent. 



i: 1 Rhamnus Brongn. Ann. Sc. Nat. x, 360. Seeds and nut- 

 lets deeply suleale or concave on the back, tin 1 raphe in the 

 hollow: flowers mostly dioecious, solitary or fascicled in the 



axils. 



R. alnifolla L'Her. Sert. Angl. 5. Shrub 2-4 feet high : leavesdecid- 

 uqus, ovate-oblong, acute at each cud or acuminate, 2 or 3 inches long, 

 crenately serrate, the slender petioles slightly puberulent: lobes of the 



