cm. long and less than 5 mm. wide, not woolly at base; scape slender, slightly 

 pubescent, shorter than to conspicuously longer than the leaves; spikes slender 

 and elongate, cylindrical, to 13 cm. long and 5 mm. thick, rather loose to expose 

 the axis, the lower spikelets remote; bracts acute, equal to or about twice as long 

 as calyx; calyx lobes ovate, with narrow green midribs; corolla lobes triangular- 

 ovate, erect and somewhat connivent with age, less than 0.5 mm. long; stamens 

 only 2; capsule about twice as long as the calyx; seeds 10 to 30, blackish, asym- 

 metrically angular, less than 1 mm. long. (?)P. heterophylla Nutt. 



In wet sands and shallow soils in rocky areas, fallow fields and flat woods, 

 occasionally in salt marshes and edge of wet meadows, in Okla. (Johnston Co.) 

 and the e. third of Tex., Apr.-May; rather widespread, especially in s. U.S. 



10. Plantago elongata Pursh. 



Annual v/ith prominent taproot; leaves narrowly linear, 3-10 cm. long; scapes 

 several to many, commonly surpassing the leaves; spikes mostly 2-10 cm. long, 

 loosely flowered so as to expose the axis; bracts ovate to triangular-ovate, mostly 

 shorter than the calyx but sometimes equal to or barely surpassing it, glabrous 

 to slightly hispid, the central herbaceous portion about as wide as the scarious 

 margins, becoming saccate at base; anterior sepals inequilateral and with narrow 

 midvein and wide scarious margins, the posterior sepals similar but conduplicate 

 and sharply keeled; corolla lobes 0.5-1 mm. long, reflexed with age; stamens 

 only 2; capsules ovoid, rounded to the summit, 1.5-3.5 mm. long; seeds normally 

 4 or more, from 1.5 mm. in length (if many seeds) to 2.5 mm. long (if only 4 

 seeds). P. pusilla Nutt. 



In moist or dry sandy soil, commonly shallowly covering flat rocks, and in 

 muddy soil about lakes and ponds, in Okla. (Waterfall) , rare in e., s. and n.-cen. 

 Tex., spring; from N.E. to the Lake States, s. to Fla. and Tex. 



Fam. 124. Rubiaceae Juss. Madder Family 



Trees, shrubs or herbs, rarely climbing; leaves opposite or whorled, simple, 

 entire; stipules often united to form a sheath, rarely leaflike; flowers perfect or 

 unisexual, regular, usually in panicles or cymes, sometimes solitary or aggregated 

 into heads; calyx tube more or less united with the inferior ovary, the segments 

 4 to 8, crowning the ovary and commonly persistent in the fruit; corolla funnel- 

 form, salverform or rotate, the 3 to 5 segments with valvate, imbricate or con- 

 torted aestivation; stamens 3 to 5, inserted on the corolla throat or at the throat, 

 the filaments free, the anthers introrse; ovary crowned by a more or less developed 

 disk, inferior or rarely half-inferior, 1- to several-celled; style filiform, often 

 divided above; fruit a capsule, berry, drupe or schizocarp (in Galium). 



Probably more than 6,000 species in about 500 genera, world-wide in distribu- 

 tion. An important family that includes coffee (Coffea spp.) and quinine {Cinchona 

 spp.) 



1. Leaves verticiUate, with foliaceous stipules 1. Galium 



1. Leaves opposite or (if verticiUate) large shrubs, with distinctive stipules (2) 



2(1). Ovules few to many in each cell of the ovary (3) 



2. Ovule solitary in each cell of the ovary (4) 



3(2). Flowers 4-merous; top of capsule nearly always extending beyond the 

 hypanthium 2. Hedyotis 



3. Flowers 5-merous; top of capsule included in the hypanthium 3. Pentodon 



4(2). Shrubs; flowers in naked dense globular heads about 15 mm. in diameter 

 4. Cephalanthus 



4. Herbs; flowers not as above (5) 



1538 



