OF ARTS AND SCIENCES: NOVEMBER 11, 1863. 233 



inches long. Flowers about half an inch long. Legume 8 to 11 lines 

 long, transversely venulose, many-seeded, considerably resembling that 

 of ^. Nuttallianus, with which (notwithstanding the obvious differences) 

 some of the specimens were confounded in the Botany of the Mexican 

 Boundary Survey. The broad and short, moderately incurved apex 

 of the carina is abruptly contracted into a short, very acute, porrected 

 cusp, which would technically refer the plant to Oxytropis. 



* * 

 * 



Obscure Species. 



A. DiAPHANUS, Dougl. in Hook. Fl. Bor.-Am. 1, p. 15], — from 

 near the Great Falls of the Columbia River, — described as having 

 hnear, somewhat diaphanous, bilocellate legumes, I have not iden- 

 tified. I learn that the plant has the aspect of A. distortus. 



A. CouLTERi, Benth. PI. Hartw, p. 307, near Monterey, California, 

 with silky-villous bilocellate legumes, would seem to belong to the sec- 

 tion Argopliylli. 



A. POLARIS, Benth. in Hook, f., Arct. PI. (Linn. Trans. 33, p. 323), 

 from Kotzebue's Sound, is said to differ from A. aJjyinus not only 

 in the size (an inch long) and upright direction of the legume, and 

 the obsolete stipe, but also in the absence of any introflexion of the 

 dorsal suture. 



Phaca debilis, Nutt. in Torr. & Gray, Fl. 1, p. 345, from the 

 Rocky Mountains, is known to me only by a flowering specimen in 

 herb. Torr. In appearance, and in the size of the flowers, it seems 

 intermediate between A. Hallii and A. flexuosus : but it is dwarf, and 

 has shorter calyx-teeth than either. The legume is a desideratum. 



Phaca parvifolia, Nutt. 1. c. p. 348, I find no specimen of; but 

 conjecture that it may, hke Nuttall's P. parvijiora, have been founded 

 on P. elegans, Hook., which is the small-flowered, American variety 

 of A. oroboides. 



Among Astragali which remain undetermined for want of sufficient 

 materials are the following : — 



1. A striking one collected, in blossom only, by Capt. Pope, on the 

 Llano Estacado, with a head or short spike of large yellowish flowers. 

 It is mentioned in the Botany of Pope's Exjiloration ; Pacif. R. R. 

 Surv. 2, p. 163. 



2. The plant, in flower only, described as a variety of A. Fremontii, 

 in Pacif. R. R. Surv. 4, p. 80 (24), collected by Dr. Bigelow on the 

 Mohave, but which is certainly different from Fremont's plant there 



