DESCRIPTIONS AND ILLUSTRATIONS OF PLANTS OF THE 
CACTUS FAMILY. 
_ Tribe 3. CEREEAE. 
| Subtribe 6. CORYPHANTHANAE. 
Terrestrial, spiny, low cacti, mostly globose, sometimes cylindric, rarely elongated, 1-jointed, 
solitary or cespitose, tuberculate, the tubercles numerous; tubercles usually arranged in spirals; juice 
watery or milky; flowers always solitary at areoles, either at top or side of plant, but never at spine- 
areoles, large or small, regular (except in the genus Cochemiea) ; ovary naked or bearing a few scales; 
fruit a green or red indehiscent berry (except in the genus Bartschella); seeds small, brown or black. 
We recognize 14 genera. 
Key To GENERA. 
A. Ovary more or less scaly (not known in Mamillopsis). 
Flower campanulate with short tube. 
Some of spines hooked............ 0. cece cece cece eee tebe neees 1. Anctstrocactus (p. 3) 
None of spines hooked (see species No. 2 in Neolloydia). 
Tubercles not deeply grooved; fruit scaly ..... 20.0.0... 0c cc eee ees 2. Thelocactus (p. 6) 
Tubercles deeply grooved; fruit nearly naked ............ 0.0.0.0... 0c 3. Neolloydia (p. 14) 
Flower-tube elongated, scaly... . 0... ccc cc cect ee eee tenn eens 4. Mamiullopsis (p. 19) 
AA. Ovary naked or nearly so. . 
B. Flowers irregular... ... 0.0... ccc cece cece cence teen ence beeen eens 5. Cochemiea (p. 21) 
BB. Flowers regular. 
C. Flowers central, borne in axils of young, usually nascent, tubercles, large 
(except in genus No. 8); tubercles containing a watery juice; fruit dull 
green or red; seeds brown or black. 
D. Tubercles grooved on upper side; flowers borne at base of groove. 
Seeds mostly light brown; fruit greenish or yellowish even when 
mature, ripening slowly.......... 0... 0c cece ccc eee eee eee 6. Coryphantha (. 23) 
Seeds black to dark brown; fruit red, maturing rapidly. 
Tubercles long, not numerous, not persisting as woody knobs; aril 
of seed large... 6... cee eee eee nee eeee 7. Neobesseya (p. 51) 
Tubercles short, numerous, persisting after spines fall off as woody 
knobs; aril of seed small..... 0.0.0.0... ccc ccc eee ees 8. Escobarta (p. 53) 
DD. Tubercles not grooved above. 
Fruit circunfscissile; tubercles fleshy; spines acicular............ 9. Bartschella (p. 57) 
Fruit not circumscissile; tubercles woody; spines pectinate....... 10. Pelecyphora (p. 59) 
CC. Flowers lateral, borne in axils of old and mature tubercles; these never 
grooved above. 
Seeds with a large corky aril... 0... cee tees 11. Phellosperma (p. 60) 
Seeds without a corky aril. 
Flowers large with an elongated tube; tubercles elongated, flabby.... 12. Dolichothele (p. 61) 
Flowers small, campanulate; tubercles not flabby. 
Hilum of seed large; tubercles lactiferous; spines pectinate...... 13. Solisia (p. 64) 
Hilum of seed minute; tubercles sometimes lactiferous, but not in 
speies dan black seeds; spines not pectinate.............. 14. Neomammillaria (p. 65) 
KK \ 9 A ) 1. ANCISTROCACTUS gen. nov. 
\ 
Small, globular oF short-cylindric plants, indistinctly ribbed, strongly tubercled, very spiny, 
one of central spines always hooked; flowering tubercles more or less grooved on upper side; flowers 
rather small, short, funnelform, borne at top of plant; ovary small, bearing a few thin scales, these 
always naked in their axils; fruit oblong, greenish, juicy, thin-walled, usually naked below but with 
a few broad cordate, thin-margined scales above; seeds globular, rather large, brownish to black, 
the papillae low, flattened; hilum large, depressed, sub-basal, surrounded by a thick rim. 
Type species: Echinocactus megarhizus Rose. 
Engelmann in describing Echinocactus scheer1, one of the species of this genus, refers 
to its anomalous characters when he says: 
‘‘Seeds are large, about 1 line long, 0.8 line in diameter, with very minute and flattened tuber- 
cles, brown (the only Echinocactus with seeds of that color known to me); hilum large and circular, 
surrounded by a thick rim; albumen very small; embryo curved but cotyledons small, connate, more 
like those of a Mammnillaria, separating on the curvature and not at the end of the hook, as in all 
other hooked embryos of Cactaceae known to me.”’ (Cact. Mex. Bound. 1g. 1859.) 
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