96 THE GERANIUM FAMILY. [Impatient. 



chiefly in northern England and North Wales, extending neither into 

 Scotland nor Ireland. FL summer till rather late. 



2. I. fulva, Nutt. (fig. 220). Orange B. — An annual closely resembling 

 the last species, except that the flowers are of a deeper orange-colour, 

 spotted with reddish-brown, and the spur is very closely bent back 

 upon the calyx, and slightly notched at the extremity. 



A North American plant, fully established along the Wey in Surrey, 

 and some other streams. FL summer. [I. biflora, Walt., is a much 

 earlier name, but it has not been adopted by American botanists.] 



The Rue (Ruta graveolens), and Fraxinella (Dictamnus Fraxinella), both 

 from southern Europe, belong to the very large family Rutacece, chiefly 

 numerous within the tropics, and in the southern hemisphere, but 

 unrepresented in Britain. The Diosmas, Corrects, and many other South 

 African and Australian plants in our plant-houses, are members of the 

 same family. 



XXI. ACERACEJE. THE MAPLE TKIBE. 



(A Tribe of Sapindacece, or the Sapindus family.) 



The Maple tribe corresponds to the Linnaean genus Acer, 

 which modern botanists have broken np into two or three by 

 the separation of a few North American or East Indian species. 

 The whole group consists, however, but of very few species, 

 ranging over the temperate zone of the northern hemisphere. 



The true Sapindacece are mostly tropical trees or lofty climbers, and 

 are seldom to be met with even in our hothouses ; but the Horsechestnuts 

 (JEsculus, Linn.), form a distinct tribe of the same family, or, according 

 to some botanists, the small adjoining family of Hippocastanece, which, 

 like Aceracece, contains a small number of trees or shrubs from the 

 northern hemisphere. The Bladder -nut of our shrubberies {Staphylea 

 pinnata, Linn.), from central and eastern Europe, is the type of the third 

 tribe or Sapindacece, in which, as in Aceracece and Hippocastanece, the 

 leaves are always opposite, whilst in the true Sapindacece they are gene- 

 rally alternate. 



I. ACER. MAPLE. 



Trees, with opposite, palmately- veined and lobed leaves, no stipules, 

 and small greenish flowers, in axillary corymbs or racemes. Sepals 

 usually 5, overlapping each other in the bud, and more or less united at 

 the base. Petals 5, or sometimes 4, or entirely wanting. Stamens 

 about 8, inserted on a thick disk below the ovary. Ovary 2-lobed or 

 rarely 3-lobed, each lobe enclosing one cell with 2 ovules suspended 

 from the inner angle. Styles 2, rarely 3, often united at the base. 

 Fruit separating when ripe into 2, rarely 3, indehiscent carpels or nuts, 

 produced into a wing at the top, and called keys or samaras. Seeds 1 

 or 2 in each carpel, without albumen. 



A genus not numerous in species, but extending over Europe, Russian 

 and central Asia, the Himalaya, and North America. It differs from all 

 British trees, except the Ash, by its opposite leaves, and from that genus 

 by the flowers, and by the palmate not pinnate leaves. 



