Vacdnium. ERICACEAE. 25 



sistent : flowers in short racemes or clusters from separate buds : bracteate and 

 2-bracteolate. 



* Flowers 5-merous, 10-androus. 



V. ovatum, Pursh. Erect evergreen shrub, 3 to 5 feet high, rigid : branchlets pubes- 

 cent : leaves thick and firm, very numerous, from oblong-ovate to oblong-lanceolate, acute, 

 minutely and acutely serrate, glabrous or nearly so, bright green both sides, an inch or so 

 long ; the veins obscure or hidden : flowers in short and close axillary clusters : bracts and 

 bractlets deciduous : corolla campaimlate, 2 lines long, rose-color or flesh-color, barely 



[ thrice the length of the triangular acute reddish calyx-lobes: berries reddish turning 

 black, small, sweetish. Fl. i. 290 ; Lindl. Bot. Reg. t. i:354. V. lanceolatum, Dunal in DC. 

 1. c. 570, a narrow-leaved form. Metagonia (Pyxothamnus) ovata, Nutt. I.e. Vancouver's 

 Island to Montevey, &c., California, on hills near the coast. 



V. crassifolium, Andr. Procumbent, the trailing slender stems 2 or 3 feet long, 

 glabrous or nearly so : leaves small, a quarter to half inch long, from oval to narrowly 

 oblong, sparsely mucronate-serrulate or entire, shining: flowers few and almost sessile in 

 small axillary clusters : bracts scaly-coriaceous, persistent: corolla globose-campanulate, 

 nearly white : anther-cells barely pointed at apex : berries black. Bot. Rep. t. 105 ; Bot. 

 Mag. t. 1152 ; Chapm. Fl. 259. V. carnosum, Pers. Syn. i. 479. V. myrtifolium, Michx. Fl. i. 

 229. Metayonia myrtifolia, Nutt. 1. c. Sandy bogs, N. Carolina to Georgia, near the coast. 

 Habit of Cranberry. 



* * Flowers 4-merous, 8-androus. 



V. Vitis-Ideea, L. (COWBERRY, MOUNTAIN CRANBERRY.) Almost glabrous, tufted, 3 

 inches to a span or more high from creeping stems : leaves crowded, obovate or oval, 

 emarginate (a quarter to over half inch long), shining above, paler and bristly dark-dotted 

 beneath ; tlie margins revolute, entire or obscurely serrulate : flowers crowded in a short 

 and terminal secund and nodding raceme: bracts reddish, nearly persistent: corolla white 

 or rose-color, open-campanulate, rather deeply 4-lobed : berries dark red, acid and bitterish, 

 edible when cooked (a fair substitute for cranberries). Fl. Dan. t. 40; Lodd. Bot. Cab. 

 t. 610. V. punrtulnm, Lam. Round the Arctic circle, south to the coast and mountains of 

 N. New-England, and LakeWinipeg; on the western coast south to British Columbia. 

 (Greenland to Japan.) 



5. OXYCOCCUS. ( Oxycoccus, Pers.) ' Corolla deeply 4-cleft or 4-parterl ; the 

 lobes linear or lanceolate-oblong and reflexecl : anthers exserted, awnless, with 

 very long terminal tubes : ovary and berry 4-celled, destitute of false partitions : 

 flowers axillary and terminal, nodding on long filiform pedicels, appearing in early 

 summer ; fruit maturing in autumn. 



* Erect shrubs, with deciduous membranaceous leaves and berries of Euvaceinium, but corolla of 

 true Oxycoccus: flowers solitary in the axils: pedicel braetless but minutely 2-bracteolate at base: 

 corolla conical-rostrate in the bud, deeply 4-cleft : filaments villous. ( V. Japonicum of Miquel is 

 a very nearly related Japanese species.) Vacdnium Oxycoccoides, Benth. & Hook. 



V. erythrocarpon, Michx. Divergently branching shrub, 1 to 4 feet high, slightly 

 pubescent : leaves oblong-lanceolate or ovate-oblong, acuminate, finely serrate with bristle- 

 tipped teeth, thin, bright green both sides, veiny, acute or merely obtuse at base (H to 

 3 inches long) : pedicel about half the length of the leaf: corolla flesh-color (about half 

 inch long) : berry light red, turning nearly black at full maturity, watery, slightly acid. - 

 Fl. i. 227. Oxi/coccus erectus, Pursh, Fl. i. 264. 0. eri/throcarpus, Ell. Sk. i. 447. --Damp 

 woods in the higher Alleghanies, Virginia to Georgia. 



* * (CKAXUFIMSY.) Trailing and creeping lignescent plants, with filiform stems, and small per- 



sistent leaves with entire revolute margins and the lower face whitened: filiform pedicels 1 to 4 

 from a terminal scaly bud, erect, and bearing a flesh-colored or pale rose-colored flower nod- 

 ding from its apex : corolla conical-cylindraceous in the bud, deeply 4-parted : filaments puberu- 

 lent : berry red and acid. Oxycoccus (Pers.), Benth. & Hook. 



V. Oxycoccus, L. (SMALL CRANBERRY.) Stems very slender, creeping: leaves ovate, 

 acute, 2 to 4 lines long ; the margins much revolute : pedicels 1 to 4 in a fascicle from a 

 terminal and not proliferous thin-scaly bud : filaments commonly fully half the length of 

 the anthers : berry globose, a quarter to a third of an inch in diameter, often spotted when 



