Dicotyledons with Gamopetalous Flowers — Ericaceae. 
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One British Genus ; Species 5. 
LEAVES usually evergreen ; deciduous in Azalea; in Heath (Ericco) narrow with revolute margins ; in Winter- 
green ( Pyrola ) round and radical, or nearly so. 
Flowers slightly irregular in Rhododendron and Azalea; the corolla dry and persisting after flowering 
(marcescent) in Ling and Heath. 
Anthers usually with spur-like appendages. 
FRUIT superior and baccate as in Strawberry-tree ( Arbutus ) ; inferior and baccate as in Cranbeny and Bilberry 
. (Vaccinium) ; or a capsule with the valves separating from the axis by the splitting of the dissepiments, as in 
Rhododendron and Ling, or by the splitting of the median line of the cavities as in Heath. 
USES, &c.—The agreeably acid fruit of Cranbeny ( Vaccinium Oxycoccos and V. macrocarpum), the insipid 
berries of Bilberry or Whortleberry ( V. MyrtiUus), and the fruits of other berry-bearing species, are collected in 
Northern latitudes for culinary purposes and dessert. A few are used medicinally. Rhododendron and its allies are 
narcotic and dangerous, and honey prepared from their flowers is said to be sometimes poisonous. 
« 
The Order includes a very large number of favourite ornamental species in general cultivation, as North American 
and Himalayan species of Rhododendron, and the old denizen of our shrubberies Rhododendron ponticum of South 
Europe ; American and Asiatic species of Azalea, differing from Rhododendron in their deciduous leaves and 
stamens equalling in number the corolla-lobes ; North American Kalmias, remarkable for the depressions in the 
corolla in which the anthers nestle before discharging their pollen ; very numerous species and garden varities of 
Heath (Erica) introduced from the Cape of Good Hope; American Andromedas, Thibaudias, Macleanias and their 
allies, with many others. 
8 
