WEST AMERICAN CRUCIFERA. 85 
larity of the calyx, I readily refer this plant here, notwithstand- 
ing that its foliage and bracts no less than its narrow pods 
would relegate it to the next genus, were not the calycine charac- 
ters to be regarded the most essential in deciding the genus. 
For a considerable group of species, among which those that 
I regard as most typical of a genus are mainly Californian and 
biennial, I propose the generic name PLEIOCARDIA, in allusion to 
what gives them an aspect decidedly their own when compared 
with members of Zuc/ista, namely, the presence of large more 
or less rounded sessile and cordate bracts—disciform organs— 
taking the place of ordinary leaves upon the flowering branches, 
often numerously subtending the racemes, By this striking 
vegetative character these plants may seem related to Eucéisia, 
in some such degree as the Old World Lepidium perfoliatum and 
its kindred, with their pinnatisect true leaves, and round disci- 
form phyllodes subtending the racemes, are related to more 
genuine Lepidium. But these with the “perfoliate” discs in 
place of upper cauline leaves were segregated from Lepidium 
under the name Candis by Adanson, and have been maintained 
in that rank by later authors under one or more later names. I 
should not hesitate to accept them as a genus. 
But this vegetative character is not essential to PLEIOCARDIA. 
While it suggested the generic name I admit to the genus a few 
species that have not that mark; and even the original species of 
Strepianthus have broad and cordate-clasping upper leaves, 
though the transition to them is not abrupt as it is in the Cali- 
fornian plants of the proposed new genus. 
The essential characters of PLEIOCARDIA are those of flower 
and fruit. Its calyx is (1) regular, not bilabiate as in Zucisia, 
(2) closely fitting up to the corolla and stamens, not distended 
and as it were inflated between base and summit; (3) tips of 
sepals dilated, recurved and scarious-edged as in neither Strep- 
tanthus nor Euclisia ; (4) petals not radiating cruciformly as in 
Streptanthus but diverging in opposite pairs as in Zucéista; (5) 
stamens in 3 unequal pairs, all distinct as in Streptanthus (in 
