419 
* * Petals broad, obovate or obcordate: stigmas usually 5 to 10, obtuse. 
+ Fruit succulent: margin of seed mostly narrow, 
- Joints glabrous, 
(1) Suberect: spines numerous, colored: fruit small, subglobose. 
2. Opuntia strigil Engelm. Syn. Cact. 290 (1856). 
Suberect. pale-green, about 6 dm. high, with the obtuse or subacute 
joints ovate, obovate, or orbicular, 10 to 12.5 em. long and 8.5 to 10 cm. 
broad: pulvini prominent, crowded (8 to 12 mm. apart), whitish-woolly 
when young, soon with pale-yellow bristles, all spiniferous: spines 5 to 
8, radiant, red or reddish-brown, yellowish toward tip, 6 to 16 mm. 
long, toward margin of joint, with 1 or 2 stouter longer (nearly 2.5 em.) 
erect, spreading, or deflexed ones (deep-brown to light reddish-brown 
to yellow): fruit subglobose, about 12 mm. in diameter, red: seeds 
thick, obtusely and narrowly margined, 3 mm. in diameter. (JU. Cact. 
Mex. Bound. t. 67)—Type, Wright 374 in Herb. Mo. Bot. Gard. 
In crevices of limestone rocks, between the Pecos and El Paso, Texas. 
Specimens examined : TEXAS (Wright 374 of 1851, 1852; Nealley of 
1891). 
(2) Erect or procumbent: joints large: spines (when present) few, stout, compressed, mostly 
colored: fruit large, mostly ovate. 
A, Unarmed. 
3. Opuntia ficus-indica (L,) Mill. Dict. ed. &, no. 2 (1768). 
Cactus ficus-indicus L. Sp. Pl. i, 468 (1753). 
Erect and proliferous, 12 to 18 dm. high, with cylindrical trunk which 
becomes woody with age: joints thickish, elliptical or obovate, 10 to 45 
em. long: pulvini immersed, distant, not spinose or rarely with a minute 
solitary spine: flowers yellow, 7.5 to 10 cm. in diameter: fruit bristly, 
obovate, red within, edible-—Type unknown. 
Throughout the West Indies (extending into southern Florida) and 
Tropical America, and cultivated south of the Rio Grande under the 
name ‘“‘nopal castillano.” 
Specimens examined: Cusa (Wright, 1860-64): CANARY ISLANDS 
(Bourgeaw 1239). 
Probably the most ancient cactus in gardens. In the Kew Index it is suggested 
that this species is identical with O. tuna, which seems to be very probable. 
4. Opuntia levis, sp. nov. 
Joints light-green, elongate-ohovate, 30 cm. long and 10 em. wide, 
gradually narrowed below, obtusely pointed above: pulvini small, oval 
(3 to 4 mm. long), 2.5 to 3.5 em. apart, gray-tomentose, with numerous 
short pale bristles, unarmed: flowers yellow, tinged with red, about 6 
cm. broad: stigmas slender, 8: fruit somewhat pyriform, 5 to 6 em, long, 
deeply umbilicate, bearing about 40 pulvilli: seed very irregular, 4 to 
5mm. in diameter, with thick acute undulate margin.—Type, Pringle 
of 1881 (distributed as O. angustata) in Herb. Coulter. 
Arizona. 
Specimens examined: ARIZONA (Pringle of 1881; Palmer 93, 95; 
Coues & Palmer 247; Vasey 247). 
Besides the spineless character, the seeds are about half as large as those of 
O, angustata, to which species it has been referred. 
