[*][*] Fruit smooth. Seeds numerous, horizontal, attached to the 3–5 parietal placentæ. Perennial.
4. Melothria. Flowers small, greenish; corolla 5-parted. Slender, climbing. Fruit small.
5. Cucurbita. Flowers large, yellow, tubular-campanulate. Prostrate. Fruit large.
1. SÍCYOS, L. One-seeded Bur-Cucumber.
Flowers monœcious. Petals 5, united below into a bell-shaped or flattish corolla. Anthers cohering in a mass. Ovary 1-celled, with a single suspended ovule; style slender; stigmas 3. Fruit ovate, dry and indehiscent, filled by the single seed, covered with barbed prickly bristles which are readily detached.—Climbing annuals, with 3-forked tendrils, and small whitish flowers; the sterile and fertile mostly from the same axils, the former corymbed, the latter in a capitate cluster, long-peduncled. (Greek name for the Cucumber.)
1. S. angulàtus, L. Leaves roundish heart-shaped, 5-angled or lobed, the lobes pointed; plant clammy-hairy.—River-banks, and a weed in damp yards, N. H. and Quebec to Fla., west to Minn., E. Kan., and Tex. July–Sept.
2. ECHINOCÝSTIS, Torr. & Gray. Wild Balsam-apple.
Flowers monœcious. Petals 6, lanceolate, united at the base into an open spreading corolla. Anthers more or less united. Ovary 2-celled, with 2 erect ovules in each cell; stigma broad. Fruit fleshy, at length dry, clothed with weak prickles, bursting at the summit, 2-celled, 4-seeded, the inner part fibrous-netted. Seeds large, flat, with a thickish hard and roughened coat.—Tall climbing annual, nearly smooth, with 3-forked tendrils, thin leaves, and very numerous small greenish-white flowers; the sterile in compound racemes often 1° long, the fertile in small clusters or solitary, from the same axils. (Name composed of ἐχῖνος, a hedgehog, and κύστις, a bladder, from the prickly fruit.)
1. E. lobàta, Torr. & Gray. Leaves deeply and sharply 5-lobed; fruit oval (2´ long); seeds dark-colored.—Rich soil along rivers, W. New Eng. and Penn. to Minn., E. Kan., and Tex. Also cult. for arbors. July–Oct.