290 



THE GOUED FAMILY. 



times all the filaments form but one mass. Ovary in the females 

 inferior, divided into 3 or 5 cells. Stigmas from 3 to 5, 2-cleft, 

 either sessile or supported on a style. Fruit succulent or juicy, 

 either indehiscent or bursting open elastically when ripe. 



A considerable Order, chiefly tropical, and more especially African, 

 with but very few species, extending into Europe or northern Asia. It 

 is very easily recognized, as well by its foliage and tendrils as by the 

 structure of the flowers. The only Order at all allied to it is that of 

 the Passion-flowers, almost all of them American, and chiefly tropical, 

 but of which some species are well known among our greenhouse or 

 stove plants. To the Gourd family belong the Cucumbers, Melons, 

 Watermelons, Gourds, Pumpkins, etc., of our gardens, most of them 

 of very ancient cultivation, but unknown in a w T ild state. 



I. BRYONY. BRYONIA. 



Calyx with 5 small teeth. Corolla 5-lobed. Anthers apparently 3, 

 of which 2 are double and 1 single. Style 3-lobed, with capitate or 2- 

 lobed stigmas. Fruit a globular berry. 



1. Common Bryony, Bryonia dioica, Linn. (Fig. 355.) 



■ J K- 



(Eng. Bot. t. 439.) 



E-ootstock perennial, thick and tu- 

 berous, sometimes branched ; the annual 

 stems climbing to a great length, and, 

 as well as the whole plant, rough with 

 minute hairs, containing an acrid juice, 

 and emitting a sickening smell in dry- 

 ing. Tendrils simple or branched, and 

 spirally twisted. Leaves more or less 

 deeply divided into 5 or 7 broad, angu- 

 lar, and coarsely toothed lobes, of which 

 the middle one is the longest. Flowers 

 dioecious, the males several together in 

 stalked racemes, of a pale yellow ; the 

 corolla broadly campanulate, about half 

 an inch diameter ; the females much 

 smaller, generally 2 together, nearly 

 rotate, with a globular ovary. Berries red or orange, about 4 lines in 

 diameter, containing several flat nearly orbicular seeds. 



Common in hedges and thickets, in central and southern Europe to 

 the Caucasus. Occurs in most English counties, and common in some, 



Fig. 355. 



