Botany of Celery 



139 



niite or wanting : flowers a dozen or more in each umbellet, 

 on short rays or peduncles, the 5 broad petals incurved and 

 surrounding the 5 anthers; calyx not evident: fruit ("seed" 

 of gardeners) one of the two separable carpels, short-oblong 

 with curved back and straight front, about 1 mm. (tV in.) 

 long, smooth, brown, bearing three prominent ridges and two 

 lesser ones on the front edge, weighing % to 1 mg. ; germinating 

 longevity 5 to 8 years ; sometimes the two carpels cohere in 

 commercial samples, making a " seed " twice the bulk of the 

 above weight ; the short recurved styles, one to each carpel, 

 are usually broken off in the commercial seed. — A plant of cul- 

 tivation, grown from early times but not of ancient domestica- 

 tion and not greatly modified from the wild plant. The wild 

 original, A. graveolens, Linn. (Celeri graveolens, Britt.) is 

 wild in ditches and wet places in Europe and Asia, mostly near 

 the sea. (The Latin word graveolens means " strong-smelling," 

 whereas dulce is " sweet " or " pleasant," here designating the 

 edible cultivated plant.) 



Var. rapaceum, DC. Prodr. iv, 101. 1830 (A. rapaceum, Mill. 

 Gard. Diet. No. 5. 1768). Celeriac. A race producing a thick- 

 ened turnip-like root (rapum is Latin for "turnip"), the leaf- 

 stalks not developed. See page 193 for cultivation. 



