308 Gleason: Studies on West Indian Vernonieae 



referred here. The latter is a virgate plant 2 meters high, and the 

 inflorescence is consequently small and composed of relatively 

 few heads. It differs in no essential way from the type. 



V. amaranthina is distinguished from V. arborescens, its nearest 

 relative, by the rounded and mucronulate inner scales of the 

 involucre and its short contracted cymes, contrasting with the 

 acute or acuminate inner scales and elongated cymes of V. 

 arborescens. 



Species-group Araripenses 



A. Leaves of a linear type, 1-5 mm. wide, one-nerved, 



more or less revolute. 



1. Leaves linear to narrowly lanceolate, 3-5 mm. wide; 



inner scales broadest above the base, purplish or 

 brown; middle and outer scales glabrate; pappus 

 tawny or pale brown. Vernonia araripensis. 



2. Leaves 1—4 mm. wide, linear; inner scales broadest 



near the base; all scales densely strigose, 

 pale-green; pappus white or very pale 

 yellowish-brown. 



a. Leaves 3-8 cm. long, densely papillose-pu- 



bescent above; inflorescence divaricately 



branched; heads 18-21 -flowered. Vernonia stenophylla. 



b. Leaves 1-3 cm. long, strigose-hispid above; 



inflorescence slender, virgate; heads 11- 



flowered. Vernonia corallophila. 



B. Leaves 4-20 mm. wide, narrowly oblong to oblong- 



obovate, mucronate; inner scales broadest above 

 the base; all scales strigose-pubescent; pappus 

 white or nearly so. 



1. Leaves narrowly oblong with parallel sides, without 



conspicuous lateral veins beneath. Vernonia angustata. 



2. Leaves broadest near or above the middle, veiny. Vernonia gnaphaliifolia. 



The status of the first three species in the key above is still 

 open to question and may require future adjustment. Gardner's 

 type locality for V. araripensis was in Brazil, and it is scarcely 

 probable that the same species occurs in the Antilles, especially 

 as far as Cuba or Santo Domingo. Authentic specimens of 

 Lessing's V. stenophylla have not been seen, and the plants 

 referred to his name differ in some slight features from the original 

 description. Both species are accepted solely on the authority 

 of certain European students of the genus. 



