5 



1.5 



poisoned by feeding, as is supposed, on the foliage of this 

 plant during the autumn : hence its name of Fall-poison. 



10. Geum radiatum. — The fine and close view of the 

 rugged Grandfather amply rewarded the toil of ascendin_ 

 this beetling ciiff, where we also obtained the Geum (Sieversia') 

 radiatum, probably the most showy species of the genus. The 

 brilliant golden flowers have a disposition to double, even in 

 the wild state, in which we often found as many as ei 

 or nine petals. This tendency would doubtless be fully deve- 

 loped by cultivation. 



11. Solidago glomerata. — Near the summit of the moun- 

 tain, we saw immense quantities of a low but very large-leaved 

 Solidago, not yet in flower, which I take to be the S. glomerata 

 of Michaux, who could not have failed to observe such a con- 

 spicuous and abundant plant, especially as it must have been 

 in full blossom at the time he ascended this mountain. It 

 does not, however, altogether accord with Michaux 's descrip- 

 tion, nor does that author notice the size of the heads, which 

 in our plant are among the largest of the genus. 



12. Leiophylla. — The only un wooded portion of the ridge 

 which we ascended, an exposed rock a few yards in extent, 

 presents a truly Alpine aspect, being clothed with Lichens and 

 Mosses, and with a dense mat of the mountain Leiophyllum, 

 a stunted and much branched shrub (five to ten inches high,) 

 with small coriaceous leaves, greatly resembling Azalea pro- 

 cumbens. The much denser growth, and the broader, more 

 petiolate, and perhaps uniformly opposite leaves, as well as 

 the very different habitat, would seem to distinguish the 

 mountain plant from the L. buxifolium of the Pine Barrens of 

 New Jersey, &c. ; but, although I think the learned DeCan- 

 dolle has correctly separated the former, under the name of 

 L. serpyllifolium, (Ledum serpyllifolium, VHer. ined.) it is 

 not easy to find sufficient and entirely constant distinctive 

 characters ; since the sparse scabrous puberulence of the cap- 

 sule may also be observed upon the ovary of the low-country 

 plant, in which the leaves are likewise not unfrequcntly oppo- 

 site ; and no reliance can be placed on the length of the 

 pedicels. The synonomy requires some correction: the 

 Ledum buxifolium' of Michaux (in summis montibus excelsis 

 Carolina?), and of Nuttall, (so far as respects the plant which 

 " is extremely abundant on the highest summits of the Catawba 

 Ridge," that is, on Table Mountain,) as well as the LeiophyU 



C— March, 1842. 



e 





