A rather large family, widely distributed, including Olive, Lilac, and
Privet; trees and shrubs; leaves mostly opposite; without stipules;
flowers perfect or imperfect, with two to four divisions, calyx
usually small or lacking, corolla with separate or united petals,
sometimes lacking; stamens two or four, on the corolla, ovary superior,
two-celled, with a short style or none; fruit a capsule, berry,
stone-fruit, or wing-fruit.
There are many kinds of Fraxinus, almost all trees.
[Sidenote: =Flowering Ash, Fringe-bush=
_Fráxinus macropétala_
=White
Spring
Arizona=]
An odd and beautiful shrub, growing on Bright Angel trail, in the Grand
Canyon, about as large as a lilac bush, with smooth, bright-green
leaves, some of the leaflets obscurely toothed, and drooping plumes of
fragrant white flowers. The calyx is very small, and the four petals
are so long and narrow that the effect of the cluster is of a bunch of
white fringe. The fruit is a flat winged-seed.
[Illustration: Small Shooting Star--Dodecatheon pauciflorum.]
[Illustration: Flowering Ash--Fraxinus macropetala.]