Aster. COMPOSITE. 123 



sharp spreading teeth ; the lowest only cordate (and mostly slightly so), or 

 often truncate at the base, on rather long margined or winged partly sheath- 

 ing petioles, which when young are usually ciliate with soft hairs, but after- 

 wards naked : upper cauline leaves ovate lanceolate or oblong, acute or 

 acuminate at each end. Flower branches erect, often nearly simple, and 

 corymbose at the summit, leafy only at the divisions. Heads larger than in 

 A. cordifolius or sagittifolius : rays about 20, blue or violet ; the disk chang- 

 ing to purple. Scales of the involucre rather few, with slender linear-lan- 

 ceolate green tips. — To this apparently well-marked and exclusively northern 

 species we also refer the specimens of Douglas which are cited under 

 A. saglttifijlius in Hooker's Flora ; which, like others from Saskatcha- 

 wan, are larger than the Arctic plant, and with more numerous and rather 

 smaller heads, but there is no other difference. In the latter, even the radi- 

 cal leaves are but slightly cordate or truncate at the base, and some of them 

 frequently taper into the petiole ; so that we find no adequate distinction be- 

 tween them and the A. precox, Lindl. in Hook., which was collected in the 

 same region. 



37. A. ciUolatus (Lindl.) : stem simple (6-8 inches high) ; leaves all 

 ovate, sharply serrate in the naiddle, ciliate, abruptly narrowed into a 

 [margined] petiole, scabrous along the margins; heads axillary, sessile or on 

 short pedicels, somewhat solitary ; scales of the involucre erect, with mem- 

 branaceous tips. Lindl. ! in Hook. fl. Bor.-Am. 2. p. 9, Sf in DC prodr. 

 5. p. 235. 



Slave Lake, Richardson ! — Dr. Lindley has remarked the close resem- 

 blance of this plant to his A. precox (our A. Lindleyanus ;-.), of which we 

 greatly fear it is only a depauperate state. The heads are smaller, and in 

 a specimen wliich bears 6 or 7 they are somewhat spicate or glomerate. 

 Like the preceding, the margins of the young leaves and petioles are fringed 

 with white hairs, which are usually deciduous when the leaves are fully 

 developed ; so that the name is not very appropriate. 



******** Heads (small and nnmerous) 'paniculate-racemose : scales of tlte caw- 

 panulate or hemispherical involucre closely hnbricated in several series, rigid, more or 

 less unequal ; the coriaceous whitish base appi'essed, with abrupt mostly squarrose or 

 spreading herbaceous tips: achenia minutely pubescent : rays (10-25) lohite or pale 

 purple : stems much bratiched or diffuse : cauline leaves rigid, sessile, linear, loMceolute, 

 or siibidate, entire ; the radical and lowermost oblunceolate or spatulate, sonietirnes 

 serrate. — Ericoidei. 



t Leaves tapering to each end, or naiTOwed at the base: scales of the involucre 

 broadest at the base, witli subulate or acute green tips. 



38. A. ericoides (Linn.) : glabrous or slightly hairy, racemose-compound; 

 the simple branchlets or peduncles racemose and mostly unilateral on the 

 virgate spreading branches ; leaves rather rigid ; the radical and lowest 

 cauline oblanceolate or oblong-spatulate, tapering into a short margined 

 petiole, often serrate ; the others linear-lanceolate and linear-subulate, entire, 

 acute at each end ; scales of the hemispherical or often slightly turbinate 

 involucre with acute or abruptly acuminate tips terminating the broader 

 closely appressed lower portion; the outermost subulate from a very short 

 base. — Linn.! spec. 2. p. 875 (excl. syn. Dill.) ; Ait. Keiv. {ed. 1) 3. p. 

 202 ; Willd. spec. 3. p. 2027 ; Pursh! fl. 2. p. 546 ; FAl. ! sk. 2. p. 348 / 

 not of Lam. Sf Michx. ! A. ericoides & A . glabellus, Nces. Ast. p. 1 07 ; 

 Lindl. ! in herb. Hook. S^'herb Torr. ; DC. ! prodr. 5. p. 242. A. sparsi- 

 florus, Michx. ! fl. 2. p. 242 ; Willd. enum. 2. p. 880, in part (also including 

 specimens of A. coridifolius & A. tenuifolius, fide Nees). A. tenuifolius, 



