Page:Illustrations of Indian Botany, Vol. 1.djvu/312

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ILLUSTRATIONS OF INDIAN BOTANY. ously cathartic ***. A drachm of the dried plant is a convenient purgative, or we may employ infusion of a handful of the recent plant. Pereira" — Lind. Fl. Med,

1. Linum Mysorense, natural size.

2. A flower.

3. The same, the petals removed to show the sepals, stamens, torus and ovary.

4. Anthers back and front views.

5. Ovary and stamens.

6. A stigma.

7. A capsule — natural size.

8. The same magnified.

9. The same cut vertically — but very erroneously representing the seed erect in [dace of attached above the middle and pendulous : a point however very difficult to make out from the dried specimen.

10. A capsule cut transversely, showing it 5-celled, with two seed in each cell.

11. A seed — with the exceptions mentioned, all more or less magnified.

 

A small order of tender herbaceous succulent plants with round branches ; alternate, or opposite, exstipulate, serrated, simple leaves : usually confined to marshy grounds, or to moist shaded situations, and of most frequent occurrence in warm humid climates within the tropics. The flowers are bisexual, irregular, axillary, solitary or fascicled, or racemose, pedicelled; white, red, or yellow.

" Sepals 5, or by abortion 3, irregular, deciduous, with an imbricated aestivation ; the two exterior opposite, lateral, somewhat unsymmetrical, with a valvate aestivation, but giving way for the projection of the spur of the odd sepal ; the odd sepal spurred, symmetrical, with an equitant aestivation in the bud, looking towards the axis of the axillary racemose or umbellate inflorescence, containing honey; the two inner sepals very small, sometimes scale shaped, sometimes unsymmetrical, larger, orbicular, always coloured, appearing at the side of the flower, which is opposite to the spurred sepal, and at the base of the odd petal; (usually altogether abortive in Balsamina). Petals either distinct or a little adhering, 5, combined into 3, irre- gular, deciduous, alternate with the sepals ; the odd petal regular, placed between the inner scale-like sepals, in front of the bract, wrapping up a great part of the remainder of the flower in aestivation ; the four remaining petals unsymmetrical, united more or less on each side of the flower in pairs ; their two larger lobes next the spur, their smaller next the odd petal ; aestivation convolute. Stamens 5, symmetrical, alternate with the petals ; those alternate with the odd petal longer than the others. Carpels 5, alternate with the stamens consolidated into a 5-celled ovary. (Roper abridged). Stigma sessile, more or less divided in 5, cells 5, two, or many seeded. Fruit capsular, with 5 elastic valves, and 5 cells formed by membranous projec- tions of the placenta, which occupies the axis of the fruit, and is connected with the apex l>y 5 slender threads ; sometimes succulent and iudehiscent. Seeds solitary, or numerous, suspended ; albumen none, embryo straight, with a superior radicle and plano-convex cotyledons."

This character is copied from Dr. Lindley's Natural System of Botany, and explains the views of Professor Roper, of Bale, of the structure of the flowers of this family which differs from that of Professor Kunth adopted in our Prodromus. These eminent Botanists take very different views of the construction of the flowers of this order of plants. Their differences may be thus explained — Kunth proceeds from a full grown flower, the spur of which is pendulous and appears on the same line with the bractea, that is, remote from the axis of the plant, (a line drawn through the stem,) hence, as the flower han^s on the stalk the spur is the lowest part, and if so placed that the axis of the flower, or a line drawn through its centre, is vertical will look towards the horizon in place of towards the axis of the plant.

Roper on the other hand commences his examinalion with the flower-bud, in the early stages of its growth, the spur in place of being the lower part of the flower next the bractea and remote from the axis is then on the upper part, and next the axis, showing clearly, that, in the progress of the flower towards maturity, the pedicel acquires a twist which changes, with respect to the axis, the relative position of all its parts. For the correctness of this last view the analogy of Orchideae may be adduced, in nearly the whole of which family, the pedicel becomes similarly twisted placing the lip of the flower, which in the hud is above, on the lower part. According to Kunth's view, the spur is the low^r or odd sepal, the lar^e upper segment of the flower two sepals united, and the two small green ones on either side are the lateral 