264 COMPOSITE. Filaginopsis. 



rather shorter wool, so that they separate readily when they fall away ; the 

 4 or 5 sterile corollas naked, connected by the crisped woolly hairs which 

 grow on the dilated limb. 



62. DIAPERIA. Nutt. in trans. Amer. j^hil. soc. {n. ser.) 7. p. 337. 



Heads fusiform-oblong, disposed in sessile glomerules of 4-5 together, 

 which are collected in large capitate and bracteate compound clusters termi- 

 nating the stem or simple and mostly proliferous branches ; the fertile flow- 

 ers 8-12, pistillate, in the axils of the chaff of the receptacle, with a much 

 attenuated filiform truncate corolla ; the 2-3 central staminate, with a tubu- 

 lar-infundibuliform minutely 4-toothed corolla, destitute of ovaries, each 

 supported by a filiform stipe and enclosed in a chaff of the receptacle. Scales, 

 of the involucre and the chaff of the small convex receptacle scarious, oval, 

 broad and large for the size of the head, closely and somewhat distichously 

 imbricated and wrapped around each other, the inner successively longer ; 

 the 2-3 innermost chartaceous, attenuate at the base, woolly towards the 

 apex, each convolute and separately enclosing a sterile flower. Style in the 

 sterile flowers undivided ; in the fertile with 2 filiform branches. Achenia 

 obovoid-oblong, obconipressed, glabrous, destitute of pappus. — A small an- 

 nual erect woolly herb, with spatulate-oblong or linear-spatulate numerous 

 sessile entire leaves; the stems sinaple or often branched from the base, ter- 

 minated by the large irregularly involucrate compound head ; from which 

 arise 1 to 5 or 6 simple branches, terminated by simple but usually smaller 

 compound heads, in the manner of the Herba imjna; and these rarely again 

 proliferous. Proper heads and primary clusters more or less bracteate. 



D. prolifera (Nutt. ! 1. c.) — Evax prolifera, Nutl. ! in DC. prodr. 5. 

 f. 459. 



Banks of Red River, Arkansas, Nuttall ! Dr. Leavenworili ! June-Aug. — 

 Stems stout, rigid, 2-5 inches high, terminated by a capitate cluster one- 

 half to three-fourths of an inch in diameter, including a large number of small 

 heads: some of the branches when numerous often arising below this com- 

 pound head. Scales of the involucre few, entirely similar to the chaff, and 

 passing into the latter, but shorter, and woolly externally : the chaff of \h% 

 fertile flowers glabrous or slightly tomentose-ciliate : that of the sterile longest 

 and more rigid, much longer than the slender corolla it encloses ; the filiform 

 stipe of the latter fully half its own length. 



63. MICROPUS. Linn. ; Geerln. fr. t. 164 ; Schkuhr, handb. t. 267. 



Heads collected in axillary sessile clusters, several-flowered ; the fertile 

 flowers 5-7, in a single series, pistillate, with a filiform corolla, enclosed in 

 the inner scales of the involucre; the 3-7 central staminate, with an infundi- 

 buliform 5-toothed corolla, naked, destitute of ovaries. Receptacle small and 

 flat. Involucre in 2 series, each of 5-7 scales ; the exterior scarious, flattish, 

 spreading, bracteiform; the interior (perhaps rather to be considered chaff of 

 the receptacle, as described by Nuttall) infolded and laterally compressed. 



