DISTRIBUTION OF TRIBES. 395 
inflorescence approaches that of the Lychnophoree, a truly Ame- 
rican type ; but the section is closely connected with the ordinary 
Lepidaplog through V. obtusata, Less., and others. Trianthea is 
more normal in general inflorescence as well as in the involucre, 
except that it contains usually only three florets; and Hremosis 
only differs in these florets being reduced to a single one. Triana’s 
Lherasia, from the mountains of Columbia, must be included in the 
section Trianthea, with a habit still nearer to that of Oliganthes. 
In the Old World when the Vernonia-capitulum becomes 3-flowered 
or only single-flowered (Monosis Wightiana, DC.) the species 
assume the habit, inflorescence, and involucres of Strobocalyx 
above referred to. 
Vernonia complicata, V. bahamensis, and V. lepidota, Griseb., 
from Cuba or the Bahamas, are insular aberrant forms which 
require further study and comparison with the S.- American genus 
Piptolepis, or the San-Domingo Piptocoma, of which last I have 
seen no specimen. 
2. In the Old World the section Stengelia, including Ascaricida, 
with the inflorescence, pappus, &c. of Lepidaploa, diverges in the 
involucres, of which the inner bracts end more or less in membra- 
nous coloured appendages, a character not carried further in any 
allied genera. In some species the sete of the pappus become 
flattened and more rigid, showing a tendency towards the palea- 
ceous pappus of the American Stilpnopappus and its allies—a 
tendeney which, however, does not appear to be carried any 
further in any Old-World genus allied to Vernonia; for Herderia 
is probably more nearly connected with Ethulia. 
The sections Gymnanthemum and Xipholepis are chiefly charac- 
terized by the reduction of the outer pappus to fine sete, few in 
number, of variable length, and sometimes disappearing altogether 
—a circumstance towards which American forms show no tendency, 
except in Lachnorhiza, a Cuban species, which, on account chiefly 
of its peculiar habit and the form of its involucre, very different 
from those of the Old- World Gymnanthema, has been admitted as 
a distinct insular genus. 
The sections Cyanopis, Lepidella, and Tephrodes exhibit a 
divergence which would at first sight appear important enough to 
raise them into a distinct genus, but that the main character, the 
4- or 5-angled, or almost terete and nerveless, not equally 10-ribbed 
achene, is so variously combined with others in species which in 
other respects would belong to Lepidaploa, and is, moreover, so 
