ERYTHRONIUM AMERICANUM. 
Common Erythronium, 
PLATE LVIIL. 
Fon a considerable time the genus Erythro- 
nium was considered as containing only one 
species, the E. dens canis of Europe and Asia. 
The American plant was considered, by Michaux, 
as a variety of the European, differing only in 
colour. Later botanists have, with propriety, 
separated it, and besides this, one or two other 
American species have been added to the genus.* 
The natural order, called Liliacew by Linneus, 
and Lilia by Jussieu, is perhaps not exceeded by 
any other, in the uniform elegance of all its spe- 
* My friend Mr. F. Boott discovered a new species of Erythro- 
nium on the Camel’s rump mountain in Vermont, which he calls Z. 
bracteatum. Its character is E. foliis inequalibus, scapo bracteato.. 
In all the specimens gathered by that gentleman, the leaves were 
very unequal, one being twice the size of the other; the scape had 
also a lanceolate bracte near the top. The flower was yellow and 
about half the size of EZ, Americanum, 
