Monocotyledons with Petaloid Flowers—A inary llidacece. 123 
leaves. Flowers perfect: -perianth-tube adherent, limb 6-leaved. Stamens 
6 ; anthers not extrorse. Ovary inferior, 3-celled. Seeds albuminous. 
Distribution. —A considerable Natural Order, widely dispersed through both Hemispheres in 
Temperate and Intertropical countries. Most numerous in the South Temperate zone at the Cape of 
Good Hope and in South America. 
Number of British Genera, 3 ; Species, 4. 
Leaves reversed by a twist at the base so as to bring the underside uppermost in Alstroemeria, a South 
American genus cultivated in gardens. 
PERIANTH with a cup-shaped appendix (corona), resembling an inner perianth, at the base of the spreading 
limb, as in Poet’s Narcissus {Narcissus poeticus), or corona tubular as in Daffodil (i Y. pseudo-Narcissus); or destitute 
of a corona as Snowdrop ( Oalanthus ). 
USES, &c. — The so-called American Aloe ( Agave americana), indigenous in Mexico, and now extensively 
naturalised in countries bordering the Mediterranean, affords in Mexico a copious saccharine juice from which a 
much-esteemed beverage called pulque is prepared. The genus Aloe belongs to the Natural Order Liliaceae. The 
juices of the bulbous Amaryllidacese are generally more or less acrid, and in some species dangerous, as in Daffodil. 
The flowers of nearly all the species are beautiful, and many genera are garden favourites; amongst the rest 
Snowdrop (Galconthus nivalis ), Snowflake (. Leucojum), and the various species and forms, natural and hybrid, of 
Narcissus , Amaryllis including the Belladonna Lily, Grinum , Pancratium , Nerine to which belongs the Guernsey 
Lily (a native originally of the Cape introduced into Guernsey by shipwreck of a cargo including some bulbs), 
Eucharis of Tropical America, Alstroemeria , Agave and Fourcroya . 
