Page:Illustrations of Indian Botany, Vol. 2.djvu/119

ILLUSTRATIONS OF INDIAN BOTANY.

57 In the accompanying plate (No. 117) I have given dissections of one species of each of DeCandolle's tribes found in this part of India, in which I have endeavoured to represent then- respective peculiarities, an attempt in which I fear, owing partly to the minuteness of the ob- jects and theoretical character of the distinctions, and partly to the imperfections of the graphic art among us, I have not succeeded to the extent I could have wished.

In explanation of these dissections I shall now subjoin his abridged characters of each tribe.

I. Suborder ORTHOSPERMJ3. Albumen flat, or nearly so, within, neither involute nor convolute, next the commissure.


 * Umbels simple or imperfect. Fruit, without vittae.

1. Hyorocotyleae. Fruit compressed laterally ; Mericarps convex or acute on the back.

Hydrocoiyle polycephala.

2. Saniculeae. Fruit ovate globose. Sanicula elata.


 * * Umbels compound or perfect ; vittae in the fruit various, rarely wanting,

f Paucijugate, namely, furnished with primary ridges only,

3. Ammeneae. Fruit laterally compressed or dedymous. Ptychotis a.jowan.

4. Seselineae. A transverse section of the fruit, round or roundish or with the miricarps somewhat compressed on the back. Foeniculum vulgare,

5. Peccedaneae. Fruit compressed from the back of the mericarps, raphe marginal, margin expanded into a single, not double, wing on each side, (in Angeliceae there is a double wing on each side). Heracleum rigens

f f Multijugnte, namely, furnished with both primary and secondary ridges

6 Cumineae. Fruit from the sides of the mericarps somewhat compressed all the ridges wingless. ( The transverse section in the figure does not very well correspond with this character, perhaps the fault of the draftsman.) Cuminum Cyminum.

^ . Daucineae. Fruit somewhat compressed or round from the back of the mericarps, with the lateral primary ridges placed on the flat commissure, the secondary ones either expanded into free prickles or the prickles united into a wing. Daucus Carota.

(The transverse section of the figure does not agree well with the character,I believe from having had bad subjects to represent).

II. Suborder C A MPYLOSPERMAE. Albumen marked with a longitudinal furrow, owing to

the involute margins.

f Multijugate.

Caucaline^e. fruit laterally contracted or roundish, the lateral primary ridges placed on the plain of the commissure, all the secondary ones expanded into prickles or bristles.

f f Paucijugate.

8. Scandicineae. Fruit laterally compressed or contracted, elongated, often beaked. Ozadia

faeniculacea.

III. Suborder C/ELOSPERMAE. Albumen next the commissure, concave or curved longitudinally, that is from the base to the apex.

(A very useless division, as the few genera belonging to it might have been with equal convenience referred to the first.)

9. Coriandreae. Fruit laterally contracted and didymous or subglobose, primary and secondary ridges wingless, often scarcely distinct. Coriandrum sativum.

Caucalineae is omitted in the plate, partly for want of room, partly because I do not think it a native of this part of India.

That Tausch's classification might not be altogether unknown among us I shall now give the characters of his tribes, indicating under each the name of the subtribes and Indian genera that belong to it.