Sepals 5. Petals 5, entire. Stamens 2--10. Styles and valves of the many-seeded pod 3, very rarely 5, when the valves alternate with the sepals! Embryo not coiled into a complete ring.--Low herbs, mostly on or near the seacoast, with filiform or linear somewhat fleshy opposite leaves, and smaller ones often clustered in the axils; stipules scaly-membranaceous; flowering all summer. (Named probably for the city so called.)--Genus also known as TISSA, Adans., SPERGULARIA, Presl., and LEPIGONUM, Wahlb. The species are very variously understood by European botanists, and are much confused, as well as the synonymy. Our forms are annual, or at the most biennial. 1. B. rùbra, Dumort. Nearly glabrous, the summit of the prostrate or ascending slender stems, peduncles, and sepals usually glandular-pubescent; leaves linear, flat, scarcely fleshy; stipules lanceolate, entire or cleft; pedicels longer than the bracts; _pods_ and pink-red corolla small (1½´´), _hardly equalling or exceeding the calyx; seeds rough with projecting points, semi-obovate_ or _gibbous-wedge-shaped, wingless_. (Spergularia rubra, _Presl._)--Dry sandy soil, New Eng. to Va., along and near the coast, but rarely maritime. (Eu.) 2. B. marìna, Dumort. More decidedly fleshy than the preceding, erect or ascending, usually pubescent, with ovate stipules, terete leaves, and pedicels 2--4´´ long; sepals usually becoming 2--2½´´ long, little shorter than the pod; petals pale; _seeds obovate-rounded and roughened with points_, wingless or narrow-winged. (Spergularia salina, _Presl._ Tissa marina, _Britt._)--Brackish sands, etc., coast of N. Eng. to Va., and southward. A form with smooth seeds is var. LEIOSPÉRMA, N. E. Brown. (S. media, _Presl._) (Eu.) Var.(?) mìnor, Watson. Small, ascending or decumbent; flowers smaller, on shorter pedicels (rarely 2´´ long), the sepals and pod 1--1½´´ long; seeds wingless, usually papillose.--Coast of N. H. and Mass. 3. B. boreàlis, Watson. Diffusely branched, glabrous; pedicels usually 2--4´´ long; petals white; pod ovate, 2´´ long, about twice longer than the sepals; seeds usually wingless, smooth or nearly so. (Tissa salina, _Britt._)--On the coast, E. Maine to Labrador. 12. SPÉRGULA, L. SPURREY. Stamens 5 or 10. Styles 5. The 5 valves of the pod opposite the sepals. Embryo spirally annular. Leaves in whorls. Otherwise as in Buda. (Name from _spargo_, to scatter, from the seeds.) S. ARVÉNSIS, L. (CORN SPURREY.) Annual; leaves numerous in the whorls, thread-shaped (1--2´ long); stipules minute; flowers white, in a stalked panicled cyme; seeds rough.--Grain-fields. (Adv. from Eu.) ORDER 16. PORTULACÀCEÆ. (PURSLANE FAMILY.)