Botany for Ladies: or, A Popular Introduction to the Natural System of Plants, According to the Classification of De Candolle.Loudon, Mrs. (Jane)
Science
Botany for Ladies: or, A Popular Introduction to the Natural System of Plants, According to the Classification of De Candolle.
Loudon, Mrs. (Jane)
Botany; Plants -- Classification
The genus Verbena is well known, from the many beautiful species now
common in every greenhouse. The fruit is two or four celled, and
a drupe or a berry, and the calyx of the flowers is tubular, and
persistent round it; but the corolla is deciduous, and falls off long
before the fruit is ripe. In the genus Verbena the calyx is tubular,
with five distinct angles, ending in five teeth. The corolla has a
cylindrical tube nearly double the length of the calyx, and a flat limb
divided into five unequal segments, which are wedge-shaped and notched,
the central one of the lower three appearing to have been slightly
pinched; the throat of the corolla is hairy. There are four stamens,
two longer than the others, the anthers having two widely-spreading
lobes, as in the Labiatæ. The style is slender below, and thickest in
the upper part; and the stigma is two-lobed. The leaves are opposite,
and furnished with stipules The flowers form a corymb in the Scarlet
Verbena, and a spike in some of the other kinds, which elongates
gradually as the flowers expand. The principal other genera are
Clerodendron, or Volkameria, Vitex (the Chaste-tree), Lantana, Aloysia
(the Lemon-scented Verbena), and Tectona (the Teak) which is so much
used in the East Indies for ship-building.
ORDER CXLIV.—MYOPORINÆ.
Australian and Polynesian plants, nearly allied to Verbenaceæ. The
principal genera are Myoporum and Avicennia, the White Mangrove of
Brazil.
ORDER CXLV.—ACANTHACEÆ.
These plants are known by the elastic opening of the capsules, which
are two-celled, and the hooked points of the seeds by which they are
attached to the placenta. The calyx remains on the ripe fruit, but in
most of the plants it is so extremely small as to be inconspicuous, and
its place is supplied by three large leafy bracts. The corolla varies
considerably, being sometimes two-lipped as in Justicia, sometimes
funnel-shaped as in Ruellia, and sometimes campanulate, with a
spreading five-cleft limb, as in Thunbergia. There are only two stamens
in Justicia and some of the other genera, but in Thunbergia, Acanthus,
and Ruellia, there are four of unequal length, inclosed within the
throat of the corolla. The ovary is imbedded in the disk, and it is two
or many seeded; the style is simple, and the stigma one or two lobed.
ORDER CXLVI.—OROBANCHEÆ.
Leafless parasites, with brown or colourless scaly stems and flowers.
The genera are Lathræa and Orobanche.
ORDER CXLVII.—LENTIBULARIÆ.
Pretty little marsh plants, natives of Europe and North America.
Pinguicula has very much the appearance of a violet, and the
Utricularias are floating plants.
ORDER CXLVIII.—PRIMULACEÆ, THE PRIMROSE TRIBE.
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