1(U5 



0;e Crcas'urg at Watmiv. 



[SEEM 



SECRETIOX. Any organic but unor- 

 ganised substance produced in the interior 

 of plants. 



SECTILE. Cut into small pieces, as the 

 pollen-masses of some orchids. 



SECTTJS. Divided down to the base. 



SECPXD. Having all the flowers or 

 leaves or other organs turned towards the 

 same side. 



SECUXDIXE. The second integument 

 of an ovule, within the primine and lying 

 over the nucleus. 



SECURIDACA. A genus of trailing 

 shrubs of the milkwort family, numbering 

 about thirty species, which are mostly I 

 natives of tropical America. They have j 

 alternate ovate or elliptical leaves ; and 

 axillary or terminal racemes or panicles ' 

 of white violet or rose-coloured flowers, i 

 in form and structure resembling those of 

 some species of Polygala, except that the 

 ovary is one instead of two-celled. The 

 fruits, which are remarkable in the family, 

 are very much like one of the two-winged 

 carpels'which make up the fruit of a maple ■ 

 (Acer). The Buaze fibre plant, S. pallida, [ 

 spoken of by Dr. Livingstone in his Travels, ' 

 belongs here, and has been described and 

 figured in the botany of Peters' Travels in 

 Mozambique, by Dr. Klotzsch, under the I 

 name of Lophostylis pallida. It is a bush 

 of four to eighteen feet high, the twigs : 

 furnished with smooth pale-green oblong j 

 leaves, and the small dingy-purple flowers 

 disposed in axillary racemes. It grows in 

 rocky places at the foot of hills near the 

 Zambesi and Shire Rivers, as well as in 

 Mozambique. The twigs are cut by the 

 natives in January and February for the 

 sake of the fibre, of which they make cord, 

 fishing-nets, &c. The fibre resembles flax, 

 and some of it brought home by Dr. Living- 

 stone, and tested by Messrs. Marshall of 

 Leeds, was pronounced equal to flax worth 

 50?. or 60L per ton. Cross-sections of the I 

 stem of this and other species are singular 

 from the absence of medullary rays and | 

 the presence of layers of bark between the 

 lasers of wood. Such a specimen may be ' 

 seen in the Museum of the Kew Gardens, 

 sent by Dr Welwitsch from Western 

 Africa. Many of the South American spe- 1 

 cies ramble to a great height over other 

 trees, and are beautiful objects when in 

 flower. The generic name alludes to the 

 hatchet-like wing of the fruit. [A A. B.] 



SECURIDACA DES JARDIXIERS. (Fr.) 



Coronilla Eraerus. 



SEDGE. Carex; also Cladium. —, 

 STTEET Acorus Cakumcs. 



SEDGES. Lindley's name for the Cype- 



SEDGWICKIA. A genus proposed by 

 Griffith for an Assamese tree which has 

 proved to be the Liquidambar Altingia of 

 Blnme. 



SEBUM. A genus of herbaceous or 

 somewhat shrubby plants, branched mostly 



from the root, and bearing at the same 

 time elongated stems, which terminate in 

 cymes of yellow white or purple flowers, 

 and other shorter flowerless stems crowded 

 with fleshy leaves, which are either flat or 

 more frequently about equal in breadth 

 and thickness. They belong to the order 

 Crassulacece, the characters being :— Sta- 

 mens twice as many as the petals ; petals 

 not united ; glands at the base of the 

 ovaries not laciniated. 



The structure of Sedums being such as 

 to enable them to vegetate for a long time 

 without absorbing moisture from the earth, 

 they flourish in most arid soils, and are to 

 be found clothing the surface of rocks, or 

 the sides of walls and quarries. Of the 

 British species belonging to the group, with 

 leaves cylindrical or nearly so, the most 

 frequent are S. acre, the Stonecrop, com- 

 mon in such localities as those described, as 

 well as on dry sandhills near the seashore— 

 a low plant with tangled stems, short fleshy 

 leaves (which are produced into a kind of 

 spur at the base), and golden-yellow flowers: 

 and,S. anglicum, similar to the last in habit, 

 with white flowers speckled with crimson. 

 S. Telephium, Orpine or Livelong, the 

 Herbe aux Charpentiers of the French, 

 is a more robust plant, twelve to sixteen 

 inches high, with large flat leaves and 

 dens.e corymbs of dull purple flowers, re- 

 sembling in habit Rhodiola rosea. Several 

 foreign species are cultivated, principally 

 for covering old walls or ornamenting 

 rockeries. French : Joubarbe. [C. A. J.] 



SEDUM A ODETJR DE ROSE. (Fr.) 



Rhodiola rosea. — FAUX-OIGNON. Sedmn 

 Cepcea. — PYRAMIDAL DES JARDI- 

 XIERS. Saxifraga Cotyledon. —REPRISE. 

 Sedum Telephium. 



SEEBRIGHT. Salvia Sclarea. 

 SEED-BOX. Zudwigia alternifolia and 

 L. hirtella. 



SEEDRA. An Arabian name for Zizy- 

 phus Lotus. 



SEEKAKAI. An Indian name for a kind 

 of soapnut obtained from Mimosa abster- 

 gens (Acacia concinna), a decoction of the 

 pods of which is used as a hair-wash in 

 India. 



SEEMAXXIA. A gesneraceous genus 

 named by Regel in honour of Dr. Berthold 

 Seemann, discovered in the Andes of Peru 

 and Bolivia by Ruiz and Pavon, but only 

 of late years introduced to Europe by the 

 Polish traveller Warscewicz. It has quite 

 the habit of Gesnera, attains a height of 

 three to four feet, and is chiefly valued by 

 gardeners on account of its bright scarlet 

 blossoms, which throughout the winter 

 enliven our hothouses, and appear in num- 

 bers in the axils of the lanceolate leaves 

 or in terminal racemes. The only known 

 species is S. sylvatica (8. ternifolia or Ges- 

 nera sylvatica). The five-cleft calyx has li- 

 near lance-shaped segments, the corolla 

 is tubular, the glandular disk surround- 

 ing the ovary is five-lobed, the stigma two- 

 lobed, and the fruit a capsule. [B. S.] 



