360 
spikes, leafy at base: bracts solitary, mostly twice longer than the flowers, spread- 
ing, subulate and rigid, narrowed into a stout awn: sepals (2 or 3) of the fertile 
flowers oblong and somewhat broader above, obtuse or retuse, setaceous-apiculate : 
_stigmas usually 2: seed circular.—On the banks of the Rio Grande. 
+ + Fruit indehiscent, 
++ Flowers monoecious, 
14. A. polygonoides L. Stem slightly pubescent, slender, branching from the 
base: leaves small, rhombic-ovate or obovate, obtuse, notched, tapering into a slen- 
der petiole: flowers crowded in short axillary clusters: calyx of the pistillate flowers 
twice as long as the subulate bracts, with a finely ribbed tube and spreading 
white border: utricle rugose above, 3-cleft at apex.—On the Guadalupe (Kendall 
County). 
++ ++ Flowers diwcious. 
1h, A. Greggii Watson. Erect, glabrous ornearly so: upper leaves rhombic-ovate, 
scarcely 2.5m, long, on short petioles, rather thick and somewhat scabrous: spikes 
elongated, leafy and interrupted at base: bracts solitary, lanceolate, acuminate, 
scarious, erect, much shorter than the fruiting calyx: sepals distinct, oblong-spat- 
ulate, acute, inner one somewhat narrow below: stigmas 3: seed small.—Near the 
mouth of the Rio Grande, 
3. CANIDA L. (WATER HEMP.) 
Characters of Amaranthus (except that the flowers are completely 
dicecious and the pistillate ones without calyx), with flowers having 1 
to 3 unequal bracts which are longer than the staminate calyx of 0 thin 
oblong mucronate sepals, 5 stamens, and 2 to 5 often long and plumose 
stigmas. 
1. A. tuberculata Moq. ‘Tall and erect, or sometimes low and decumbent: leaves 
lanceolate, acute or acutish (sometimes obtuse): sepals of sterile flowers lanceolate, 
acute or acuminate; pistillate flowers closely clustered in more or less dense naked 
or leafy axillary and terminal spikes (or the axillary capitate): bracts rather rigid, 
acuminate, equaling or exceeding the fruit which dehisces irregularly : stigmas slen- 
der, filiform, almost plumosely hairy. (Montelia tamariscina Gray, in part.)—River 
banks, ete., from San Antonio to the San Pedro, 
2, A.tamariscina Gray. Like the last, but with a circumscissile fruit which is 
shorter than the bracts, pistillate flowers in slender virgate pedunculate less glom- 
erate spikes, and stigmas similar or shorter, (Montelia tamariscina Gray, in part. )— 
From Arkansas through Texas to New Mexico. 
4. ACANTHOCHITON Torr. 
Annual slender smooth herb, with alternate elongated linear-lanceo- 
late aristate-acuminate entire leaves, dicecious dissimilar flowers in 
axillary glomerate clusters, bractless staminate flowers with 5 Janceo- 
late-acuminate sepals, pistillate flowers hidden by the large broadly 
cordate rigid spinulose-tipped bracts and with no sepals, and a flattened 
circumscissile utricle. 
1. A. Wrightii Torr. Erect, slightly branching: leaves with prominent midrib 
and tapering to a slender petiole: bracts of the pistillate flowers imbricated towards 
the ends of the branchlets, interlocked, shining, reticulate-veiny, with crenulate 
membranaceous margins.—From the alkaline flats and sandy plains of the Pecos to 
the mouth of the Rio Grande, 
