721 
LX. UMBELLTFER/E. 
8. APIUM, Linn. 
(Derivation obscure.) 
Calyx-teeth inconspicuous. Petals ovate or broad, with a short indexed tip, 
the margins not recurved, scarcely imbricate. Disk rather thick, confluent with 
the conical base of the styles. Fruit short, slightly compressed laterally. 
Carpels ovoid, with 5 prominent ribs, the lateral ones close to the rather narrow 
commissure, with 1 vitta under each furrow, and usually 2 at the commissure. 
Carpophore undivided. Seed nearly terete, straight. — -Erect or prostrate herbs. 
Leaves ternately or pinnately dissected. • Umbels compound, leaf-opposed or 
terminal, without involucral bracts. 
The genus, whether limited to 3 or 4 species, or further extended to include several species 
distinguished upon slight grounds by modern botanists, will be found to extend over most of the 
temperate and warmer regions of the globe. Both the Australian species have a wide range, one 
chiefly in the southern hemisphere without the tropics, the other in America and tropical 
Africa. — Benth. 
Leaves once or twice pinnate, with 3 or ■> more or less divided broad or 
narrow segments 1. .4. australe. 
Leaves ternately divided into numerous filiform segments or lobes ... 2. A. leptophyllum. 
1. A. australe (Australian), Thou.: Hool;. /. FI. Tamil, i. 160; Benth. FI. 
Anstr. iii. 372. Stems usually prostrate or decumbent, rarely erect, from very 
short to 1 or 2ft. long, or even more. Leaves once or twice pinnatipartite, very 
variable in size and shape, the segments 3-partite, with incised lobes, from 
broadly obovate to narrow-linear, the lower ones on rather long petiolules. 
Umbels sessile or very shortly pedunculate at the nodes, of from 3 to 6 rays, 
each with a small umbel of rather numerous white flowers, without involucral 
bracts. Disk broad and thick, almost flat. Carpels with the primary ribs very 
prominent, almost corky, and narrow furrows between them ; vittae usually broad, 
but not very distinct. : — A. prostratum, Labill. PI. Nov. Holl. i. 76 t. 103 ; Vent. 
•Tard. Malm. t. 81 ; Petroselinum prostratum, DC. Prod. iv. 102; Hook. Ic. PI. t. 
305 ; Helosciadium australe, Bunge in PI. Preiss. i. 294 ; H. prostration, Bunge, 
l.c. 295. 
Hab.: Very common in swamps. 
There are 2 common forms, one with short broad very obtuse leaf-segments, chiefly found 
near the sea ; and some specimens from the seacoast of Tasmania, the islands of Bass’s Straits 
and adjoining coasts of the mainland, have a thick almost woody stem and large thick leaves 
divided into very numerous small obtuse segments. The other form has numerous long narrrow 
acute linear segments, and often seems too unlike the maritime one to belong to the same species, 
but the intermediates between the two are very numerous, passing gradually from the one to the 
other.— Benth. 
The species is also in New Zealand, the S. Pacific Islands, Antarctic America, and perhaps in 
South Africa. It is very near the wild celery of the northern hemisphere (A. yraveolens, Linn.), 
but that has generally an erect stem, and the ribs of the fruit appear to be always much more 
slender, with broad furrows between them. — Benth. 
2. A. leptophyllum (divisions of leaf very narrow), F. v. M. Herb.; Benth. 
FI. Anstr. iii. 372. An erect or diffuse slender glabrous annual of 1 to 2ft. 
Leaves ternately divided into numerous filiform segments, the lower ones 
petiolate, the upper ones sessile, with fewer segments. Umbels at the nodes 
sessile or pedunculate, of 2 or 3 slender rays, each with a partial umbel of many 
flowers on slender pedicels, without involucral bracts. Disk rather broad, convex, 
scarcely distinct from the very short styles. Ribs of the carpels very prominent 
and thick, almost corky, separated by very narrow furrows, with one vitta under 
each hirrov> r .—Heloseiadiion leptophyllum, DC. Prod. iv. 105, with the numerous 
synonyms adduced. 
Hab.: Brisbane River, Moreton Bay; a common weed. 
The species is common in South America, extending to the southern States of North America, 
and is also found in tropical Africa. —Benth, 
