229 
man* added a third, Zradescantia pilosa. With the exception of 
Walter all these authors used the same two specific names, apply- 
ing Ventenat’s Zradescantia rosea properly and making Tiadescantia 
Virginiana elastic enough to embrace everything else savoring of. 
Tradescantia that existed in their respective regions. Walter ap- 
plied the name /rginica not to the Linnaean type, but to the form 
that Ventenat later described as 7iadescantia rosea and proposed 
the name cristaca for one of the larger forms which most authors 
thought was the real Zradescantia Virginiana of Linnaeus, but judg- 
ing from Walter’s description I am inclined to think he had in 
mind a later described species. 
Rafinesque’s work on the southern Tradescantias must needs be 
mentioned. This eccentric author described no less than twenty- 
six species and varieties in eastern North America, thus treating 
the genus from the standpoint of extreme segregation just as the 
authors mentioned above treated it from the standpoint of ex- 
treme aggregation. Rafinesque apparently founded a species on 
nearly every specimen he collected and of course his work needs 
extensive reduction, but to what previously described species to 
refer many of the Rafinesquian names is a difficult task. How- 
ever, several of the forms he described, prove to be excellent 
Species, for example, Zradescantia brevicaulis which Dr. Morong 
restored several years ago t and Tradescantia reflexa which I re- 
Store in this paper. 
An attempt to segregate the material in an herbarium on the 
lines laid down in the several different works above referred to 
must at once prove futile and not until we recognize the several 
segregates into which the Virginiana type naturally separates it- 
self can we hope for a clear or scientific interpretation of the 
group from a specific standpoint. : 
Key to the Species. 
racts. 
Umbel-like cymes peduncled, subtended by small or minute b 
Leaves ovate or ovate-lanceolate; sepals 2-3 mm. long. 1. 7. Floridana. 
Leaves linear or almost filiform; sepals 5-6 mm. long. 
Umbel like cymes sessile, subtended by large leaf-like bracts. 
Leaves linear or linear-lanceolate, 12-50 times longer than broad, more or less 
involute; plants glabrous, villous, hirsute or glandulgf 
2. T. rosea, 
* FL S. States, 498. 
+ Bull. Torr. Club, 20: 470. 
