Monocotyledons with Petaloid Flowers — Liliacecz. 
I2 5 
4. Melanthe.^e. —Leaves parallel-veined. Flowers perfect or unisexual. Stigmas distinct. Anthers extrorse. 
Example : Autumnal Crocus ( Colchicum ). 
ROOT tuberous or fibrous from a short stock, as in Asphodel ( Asphodelus ); fibres from a bulb as in Tulip, 
Hyacinth, and Onion (Allium), in each of which the scales of the bulb are broadly overlapping and the bulb smooth, 
and Lily (Lilium), in which the bulb is scaly ; or roots from a creeping rhizome as in Lily-of-the-Valley. 
LEAVES usually parallel-veined, excepting in Trillideae ; radical or cauline, rarely sub-opposite or whorled ; 
reduced to minute scales subtending branchlets (cladodes), which are fascicled, acicular, and frequently flower-bearing 
in Asparagus ; solitary, stiff, vertical and leaf-like in Butcher’s Broom. 
INFLORESCENCE various: flowers solitary in Tulip, a raceme in Hyacinth and Lily-of-the-Valley, an umbel in 
Garlick. 
USES, &c. — A few species afford a tenacious fibre used for cordage and the like, as New Zealand Flax 
(Phormium tenax) and Bowstring Hemp, obtained from the leaves of the Indian Sanseviera zeylanica. Of drugs, 
the more important are : — aloes, the inspissated juice which flows from fresh-cut leaves of African species of Aloe, 
one species of which, cultivated in the West Indies, affords Barbadoes aloes; squill, the bulb of Scilla maritima, a 
plant allied to the Hyacinth, collected on the Mediterranean shores of North Africa; colchicum, afforded by the 
Autumnal Crocus ( Colchicum autumnale), widely diffused in the meadow-lands of Europe ; and veratrum, the root 
of Veratrum album, growing wild in Alpine pastures of Central Europe. 
The flowers of many Liliaceae are eminently beautiful, and species of several genera are amongst our oldest 
garden favourites, as: White Lily (Lilium canclidum), now established as though wild in South Europe, though 
perhaps originally from the East; Orange Lily (L. croceum), Martagon Lily (L . Martagon), both European species; 
Tiger Lily (Z. tigrinum ), introduced from Eastern Asia, and many other true Lilies ; Lily-of-the-Valley (Gonvallaria 
majalis), indigenous in Britain and eastward through Europe to Asia; Fritillary and Crown Imperial (Fritillaria), 
