ORDER 175. LOBELIACEiE. T he Cardinal-Flower
T ribe.
Calyx superior, 5-lobed, or entire, with an irregular, 1-petalled
corolla, 5-lobed, or 5-cleft; stamens 5, inserted into the calyx ;
ovary inferior, 1 — 3-celled ; leaves alternate.
Acrid and dangerous plants, and some are very poisonous ;
they abound within and near the tropics.
L obelia. L. 5. 1.
Named in honor of Lobel of Lisle, physician and botanist to
James the First of England. Nearly 100 species have been described
; about a dozen belong to North America, and 7 to this
State ; only 3 to Europe.
Stamens united into a tube towards the summit; corolla irregular,
cleft on the upper side towards the base.
L . cardinalis. L. Cardinal Flower. Grows on the banks
of streams in alluvial soil, and in alluvial meadows and low
grounds, 2 or 3 feet high, leafy, and bearing a long spike of fine
scarlet flowers, and hence its common name. It is a splendid
plant when in flower, and is found over much of the United States ;
it is easily cultivated in gardens, and forms a fine border flower.
L . fulgens, W., and L . splendens, W., both from Mexico, are
the two other “ grand ornaments of this genus.” All are cultivated
in England, with more than 30 other species. Loudon.
L . injlata. L. Indian Tobacco. The leaves contain a
white, viscid juice of a very acrid taste, and very poisonous to
the human system ; the plant operates as a violent emetic, and is
the dangerous medicine of many who are called vegetable doctors,
or botanic physicians. This species is spread extensively over
the fields, and in waste grounds, varying much in height, and
when over a foot high is much branched, bearing small, light-blue
flowers ; the fruit-vessel enlarges, and becomes much inflated in
maturity.
The driveling of horses which are pastured in August and
September, is attributed to the noxious salivating properties of
this plant.
L. pallida. Muhl. A common plant over fields, 1 - 2 feet
high, slender, not branched, with quite small flowers, bluish, and
the spatulate root-leaves early decaying ; June and July.
L . Kalmii. L. As tall as the last, but more slender ; entire
leaves linear, and flowers on long foot-stalks ; fields ; much more
rare than the others.
L . Dortmanna. L . Common to Britain and this country ;
stem a foot or more high, with pale-blue flowers, pendulous, and
remotely racemed ; swamps and wet grounds ; July.
L. syphilitica. L. From 1 to 3 feet high, and larger in proportion
than the others, with sessile, ovate-lanceolate leaves,' and
large blue flowers on short pedicels ; swamps I August and September.
If this plant ever had any special action upon the disease
after which it is named, and which is the manifest curse of
divine providence upon the particular guilt of man, it appears long
since to have been deprived of its influence.
L . Nuttallii, R. and S., seems to occur in a few places, in
swamps ; small, filiform, 2 feet high, with oblong-linear leaves.
ORDER 181. CUCURBITACEjE . T he G ourd T r ib e .
Calyx 5-toothed, sometimes obsolete ; corolla with 5 divisions,
scarcely distinguishable from the calyx, with strongly marked
veins ; stamens 5, distinct, or cohering in 3 parcels ; stigma very
thick; ovary inferior, 1-celled, and the fruit fleshy, succulent,
showing the scar of the calyx, and having flat seeds ; stem succulent,
climbing by means of tendrils or rooting by them ; leaves
palmate, or with palmate ribs, succulent ; flowers white, red,
yellow, usually diclinous, or with stamens and pistils in different
flowers, sometimes monoclinous.