2 50 
PHARMACEUTICAL BOTANY 
metrical almost always six-androus flowers. Stem either short 
creeping underground ( Polygonatum ) or swelling up and forming 
bulbs (Hyacinth), or corms ( Colchicum ), or stem may elongate above 
ground and become wiry and herbaceous or semi-shrubby as Smilax, 
Fig. ( i22 . — Acorus calamus. (Sayre.) 
or the stem may remain short giving rise to thick fleshy and sap- 
storing leaves as in Aloe. Leaves linear to lanceolate, ovate, rarely 
wider, divisible into sheathing base, narrow petiole and expanded 
blade. Venation, parallel becoming in some ovate leaves parallel 
