2. R. lanceolàta, Pursh. Leaves oblong-lanceolate and acute, or on flowering shoots oblong and obtuse, finely serrulate, smooth or minutely downy beneath; petals deeply notched; fruit 2-seeded.—Hills and river-banks, Penn. (Mercersburg, Green) to Ill., Tenn., and westward. May.—Shrub tall, not thorny; the yellowish-green flowers of two forms on distinct plants, both perfect; one with short pedicels clustered in the axils and with a short included style; the other with pedicels oftener solitary, the style longer and exserted.
§ 2. FRÁNGULA. Flowers perfect; nutlets and seeds not furrowed; cotyledons flat, thick; rhaphe lateral.
3. R. Caroliniàna, Walt. Thornless shrub or small tree; leaves (3–5´ long) oblong, obscurely serrulate, nearly glabrous, deciduous; flowers 5-merous, in one form umbelled, in another solitary in the axils, short peduncled; drupe globose, 3-seeded. (Frangula Caroliniana, Gray.)—Swamps and river banks, N. J., Va. to Ky., and southward. June.
3. CEANOTHUS, L. New Jersey Tea. Red-root.
Calyx 5-lobed, incurved; the lower part cohering with the thick disk to the ovary, the upper separating across in fruit. Petals hooded, spreading, on slender claws longer than the calyx. Filaments elongated. Fruit 3-lobed, dry and splitting into its 3 carpels when ripe. Seed as in § Frangula.—Shrubby plants; flowers in little umbel-like clusters, forming dense panicles or corymbs at the summit of naked flower-branches; calyx and pedicels colored like the petals. (An obscure name in Theophrastus, probably misspelled.)
1. C. Americànus, L. (New Jersey Tea.) Leaves ovate or oblong-ovate, 3-ribbed, serrate, more or less pubescent, often slightly heart-shaped at base; common peduncles elongated.—Dry woodlands. July.—Stems 1–3° high from a dark red root; branches downy. Flowers in pretty white clusters, on leafy shoots of the same year. The leaves were used for tea during the American Revolution.
2. C. ovàtus, Desf. Leaves narrowly oval or elliptical-lanceolate, finely glandular-serrate, glabrous or nearly so, as well as the short common peduncles. (C. ovalis, Bigel.)—Dry rocks, W. Vt. and Mass. to Minn., Ill., and southwestward; rare eastward. May.
Order 28. VITÀCEÆ. (Vine Family.)
Shrubs with watery juice, usually climbing by tendrils, with small regular flowers, a minute or truncated calyx, its limb mostly obsolete, and the stamens as many as the valvate petals and opposite them! Berry 2-celled, usually 4-seeded.—Petals 4–5, very deciduous, hypogynous or perigynous. Filaments slender; anthers introrse. Pistil with a short style or none, and a slightly 2-lobed stigma; ovary 2-celled, with 2 erect anatropous ovules from the base of each cell. Seeds bony, with a minute embryo at the base of the hard albumen, which is grooved on one side.—Stipules deciduous. Leaves alternate, palmately veined or compound; tendrils and flower-clusters opposite the leaves. Flowers small, greenish, commonly polygamous. (Young shoots, foliage, etc., acid.)
[*] Ovary surrounded by a nectariferous or glanduliferous disk; plants climbing by the coiling of naked-tipped tendrils.