192 NORTH AMERICAN FLORA [VoLUME 21 
6. SALPIANTHUS Humb. & Bonpl. Pl. Aequin. 1: 155. 1807. 
Boldoa Lag. Gen. & Sp. Nov. 9. 1816. 
Cryptocarpus H. B. K. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 2: 187. 1817. 
Large herbs or sometimes shrubs (the roots sometimes tuberous ?), much branched, the 
branches pubescent and usually viscid. Leaves alternate, petiolate, the blades broad, entire. 
Flowers perfect, exinvolucrate, ebracteate, small, glomerate or racemose, forming terminal 
and axillary, paniculate cymes; perianth campanulate, urceolate, or tubular, green or reddish, 
scarcely accrescent in age and persistent, pubescent and glandular-viscid, the limb 4-dentate, 
the teeth valvate, short. Stamens 3 or 4, inserted on a small fleshy disk, shortly united at 
the base, or sometimes only on one side, opposite the perianth segments; filaments exserted, 
filiform, flexuous, unequal; anthers didymous, the cells globose. Ovary sessile, attenuate 
to a filiform style; stigma acute. Fruit utricular, subglobose, compressed, costate on one 
side, coriaceous. Seed with the testa adherent to the pericarp; embryo hippocrepiform, the 
cotyledons plane, enclosing the copious endosperm, the radicle elongate, descendent. 
Type species, Salpianthus arenarius Humb. & Bonpl. 
Perianth campanulate, little exceeding the fruit, green, 2.5—3 mm. long, bearing 
numerous uncinate hairs. 1. S. purpurascens, 
Perianth tubular, several times as long as the fruit, reddish or whitish, 5-7 mm. 
long, without uncinate hairs. 
Perianth 5 mm. long; branches of the inflorescence flexuous, almost equally 
dichotomous; racemes 2—5 cm. long; leaves sessile or nearly so. 2. S. aequalis. 
Perianth 6—7 mm. long; branches of the inflorescence not flexuous, alternate; 
racemes 1—2 em. long; leaves conspicuously petiolate. 
Perianth densely villous, especially above, the teeth broadly triangular, 
connivent or incurved; stems short-villous above. 3. S. avenarins. 
Perianth usually puberulent, or sparsely villous, the teeth triangular, 
erect or slightly spreading; stems puberulent. 4. S. macrodontus. 
1. Salpianthus purpurascens (Cav.) H. & A. Bot. Beech. Voy. 308. 
1837. 
Boldoa purpurascens Cav.; Lag. Gen. & Sp. Nov. 10. 1816. 
Boldoa ovatifolia Lag. Gen. & Sp. Nov. 10. 1816. 
Cryptocerpus globosus H. B. K. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 2: 187. 1817. 
Boerhaavia rhomboidea Humb.; Spreng. Jahrb. Gewéchsk. 13: 66. 1818. 
Boldoa paniculata Mart. & Gal. Bull. Acad. Brux. 10!: 356. 1842. 
meee aa petiolare Mart. & Gal. Bull. Acad. Brux. 10?: 345. 1843. Not C. petiolare H. B. K. 
Cryptocar pus rhomboideus Moq. in DC. Prodr. 132: 88. 1849. 
Plants herbaceous, about a meter high, much branched, the branches slender, subangulate, 
green, sparsely puberulent or glabrate, those of the inflorescence viscid and bearing numerous 
short uncinate hairs; petioles 1-11 cm. long, slender, marginate above; leaf-blades broadly 
rhombic-ovate to ovate-deltoid, 4.5-22 cm. long, 3-18 cm. wide, acute to attenuate at the 
apex, usually abruptly so, the tip usually obtuse, abruptly acute or acuminate at the base and 
often long-decurrent, bright-green, finely scaberulous when young, glabrate in age; flowers 
sessile or subsessile, glomerate or in short dense racemes at the ends of the slender paniculate 
branches of the inflorescence; perianth subglobose or urceolate, terete, 2.5-3 mm. long, green, 
densely glandular-puberulent and bearing numerous short uncinate whitish hairs, 4-dentate, 
the teeth broadly ovate-triangular, obtuse; stamens 4, exserted, flexuous; fruit subglobose, 
slightly compressed, 1.5 mm. in diameter; seed black, lustrous, smooth. 
TYPE LOocALITy: Cuba. 
DISTRIBUTION: Sinaloa and Jalisco to Veracruz and Guatemala; Cuba; also in northern South 
America. 
ILLUSTRATION: H. B. K. Nov. Gen. & Sp. fl. 123. 
2. Salpianthus aequalis Standley, Contr. U. S. Nat. Herb. 13: 392. 
1911. 
Shrub, or frutescent only at the base, 7-10 dm. high; branches stout, terete, reddish, 
cinereo-puberulent, the branches of the inflorescence rather stout, very flexuous, subequally 
dichotomous, densely grayish-villous with short hairs, not viscid; leaf-blades rhombic-ovate 
