A bushy-headed shrub, from 8 to 12 feet in height: 

 bark of the trunk greyish brown, of the larger branches 

 ash-coloured: bud small short and obtuse: young shoots, 

 petioles, peduncles and calyxes downy, or nearly tomentose. 

 Leaves pinnate with an odd one, 7-9-paired, leaflets oval, 

 obtuse, green, naked above, furred underneath, from an 

 inch to an inch and half in length, shortly petioled: stipules 

 in pairs at the base of both the general and the partial 

 petioles, small, subulate. Spikes terminal, 4-6 inches 

 long: flowers small, violet-blue; pedicles shorter than 

 these. Calyx permanent, shallow, turbinate, scored, cleft 

 at the border into 5 short teeth. Corolla (vexillum) oval, 

 concave, obtuse, full as large again as the calyx. Stamens 

 longer than the corolla; filaments straight, almost entirely 

 detached from each other, fascicled, a little spreading to- 

 wards the top ; anthers of a rich deep yellow colour, mak- 

 ing a fine contrast with the deep blue corolla. Germen 

 oval; style subulate. Pod from 2 to 2 lines and a half 

 long, slightly curved, besprinkled with small glandular tu- 

 bercles, slightly villous, terminated by a small point formed 

 by the remnant of the style: seeds 2, reniform. 



We have 4 species upon record, of which only the pre- 

 sent was known to Linnaeus. Nana (microphylla. Pursh) 

 reaches only from 6 inches to a foot in height, and is found, 

 according to Mr. Nuttall, on the woodless grassy hills of 

 the Missouri, from the River Platte to the Mountains dif- 

 fused like heath in Europe over hundreds of acres in suc- 

 cession, seeming to be the only upland shrub capable of 

 withstanding the peculiarities of that climate. The most 

 ornamental species is canescens; found from the banks of the 

 Fox River and the Ouiconsin to the Misisippi; round St. 

 Louis, in Louisiana, and on the banks of the Missouri, 

 probably to the Mountains. 



The technical distinctions principally relied on to mark 

 our present species from the rest seem to be, its having only 

 one of the calycine teeth pointed, instead of all being so, 

 and a two-seeded, instead of a one-seeded, nod. 



