AMELANCH1ER (the Savoy name of the Medlar), a genus of plants belonging to the sub-order Pomecc (Pomacecr, Lindley), of the order .Rosacece. It has a 5-cleft calyx with lanceolate petals, and an ovary of 10 cells, with a solitary ovule in each. The mature fruit is 3-5 celled, with one seed in each cell. The species are small trees, with simple serrated deciduous leaves, and racemes of white flowers.
A. mulgaris, the common species, is a native of rugged places throughout Europe. It is the Avonia rotundifolia of Persoou.
A. Botryapium, the Grape-Pear or Canadian Medlar, is a very com mon plant in Canada ; it is also a native of Newfoundland, Virginia, and the higher parts of Columbia. It is a shrub 6 or 8 feet in height, with a purple fruit.
A. °rags is also a shrub 6 or 8 feet high, and is a native of North America, throughout Canada from Lake Huron to the Saskatchewan and Mackenzie rivers, and as far as the Rocky Mountains. Sir John Richardson says that it "abounds on the sandy plains of the Sas katchewan. Its wood, named by the Crees Meesass-quat-ahtiek, is prized for making arrows and pipe-stems. and is thence termed by
the Canadian voyageurs 'Bois de Fleche: Its berries, about the size of a pea, are the finest fruit in the country, and are used by the Crees under the name of Meesasscooloom-meena both in a fresh and dried state. They make a pleasant addition to pemmican, and excellent puddings very little inferior to plum-pudding." Another North American species is known by the name of A. sanguinect. Its fruit is of a blood-red colour.
(Don, Dichlamydeouz Plants.) AMENTA'CEtE, a name sometimes given to a group of plants, chiefly forest-trees, found in the north of Europe, Asia, and America ; the flowers of which arc arranged in a dense deciduous spike, called by botanists an A nient um. Such are the poplar, the birch, the hazel, the willow, the oak, and many others. But as these genera are in fact constructed in very different manners, Amentacece are more correctly separated, by modern botanists, into several different orders. [CORYLACE/E ; SALICACE/E ; BETULACEJE, &c.]