ORDER X. SARRACENIEÆ.—THE SIDE-SADDLE PLANT.
There is only one genus in this order, which can never be mistaken for any other, from the pitcher-shaped petioles of its leaves, and its singular flowers. It is a native of Canada, but it rarely flowers without a stove in England. It is a dwarf plant, and it is thus easily distinguished from the Chinese Pitcher plant, which grows eight or ten feet high, and which belongs to quite a different order.
ORDER XI. PAPAVERACEÆ.—THE POPPY TRIBE.
This tribe contains several genera, all of which have a thick glutinous juice when broken, which poisons by stupifying. The genera most common in British gardens are Papaver, the Poppy; Argemone, the Prickly Poppy; Meconopsis, the Welsh Poppy; Sanguinaria, Blood-root; Eschscholtzia; Hunnemania; Rœmeria; Glaucium, Horned Poppy; Chelidonium, Greater Celandine or Swallow-wort; Hypecoum; Platystemon, and Platystigma. Most of these plants are either annual, or last only two or three years, and they have all very handsome flowers, which are generally large and of showy colours.
The common Corn Poppy (Papaver Rhœas) has a showy flower, the corolla of which consists of
Fig. 111.—Flower, leaf, and seed-vessel of the common Poppy. four very large scarlet petals, the outer two much exceeding the others in size (see a in fig. 111). The calyx is green, and it is divided into only two sepals, (see b,) which fall off soon after the expansion of the flower. The petals are all curiously crumpled in the bud, and they present quite a wrinkled appearance when the flowers are first opened. The stamens are very numerous, and the anthers, which are black, are of the kind called innate; that is, the filament is only attached to them at the lower part (c). The seed-vessel of the Corn Poppy is, when ripe, a dry leathery capsule (d) with numerous angles, each angle indicating a carpel; for the capsule of the Poppy, though one-celled when ripe, consists, in fact, of a number of carpels grown together. The remains of these imperfect carpels are perceptible in the little valves shown at f, which open at the top of each to discharge the seed when it is ripe; and in the slightly-peaked cover (e), which consists of as many stigmas grown together as there appear to have been carpels. When the capsule is cut open (as shown in the capsule at g, from which the fourth part has been removed), remains of the carpels will be found in several projections from the sides, which partially divide the inside of the capsule into several imperfect cells, in which the young seeds are formed; though none of these portions reach the centre. The ovules, when first formed in the ovary, are attached to these projections, which are called parietal placentæ; but as the seeds ripen they become loose, and if a dry Poppy-head be shaken, they will be found to rattle. The leaves of the Corn Poppy are what is called pinnatifid, (see h in fig. 111,) that is, they are so deeply cut as to appear almost in separate leaflets; and the whole plant (except the petals and the capsule) is covered with short bristly hairs (i), which stand out horizontally.