484 CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 



or in some instances erroneous mixing of specimens in dif- 

 ferent stages of growth, could not be made to agree with 

 actual living species. In endeavoring to rectify these una- 

 voidable errors, no doubt largely due to a too exclusive 

 reliance on dried specimens for systematic definition, I was 

 obliged in the first instance to take into consideration that 

 widely applied name of ArctostapJiylos pungens, HBK, 

 which has heretofore absorbed most of the poorly defined 

 forms brought back in collections, not alone from its orig- 

 inal location on the table-lands of tropical Mexico, but 

 extending northward along the Sierra-Madre, and appear- 

 ing again in unusual rich development on the North Pacific 

 -coast, and the Calif ornian Sierra Nevada. Aside from tlie 

 extreme improbability that a shrub of such peculiar charac- 

 ter, not easily adapting itself to changed conditions, 

 either in nature or cultivation, should exhibit such a wide 

 geographical distribution — neither the published figures of 

 the true Mexican plant, nor the original description could, 

 except by a forced construction, apply to our well known 

 Californian Manzanita, as seen in the lower foot-hills or the 

 high Sierras. I have therefore undertaken to give a com- 

 plete and detailed description of this species, combining 

 the common with the botanical name, viz. : 

 ArctostapJiylos Manmniia. 



Another species, presenting very constant and distinct 

 characters, such as no one in the field would fail to recog- 

 nize, in its dense gregarious habit and singular glaucous 

 foliage, has been strangely confounded with the widely dis- 

 tinct A. glauca, Lindl., with which it agrees only in leaf 

 characters. As this common foot-hill Manzanita, ranging 

 from Southern Oregon to Central California, and possibly 

 beyond, has never yet been clearly defined, I have herewith 

 named, from a very marked character of the inflorescence, 

 Ardosiaphylos viscida . 



Besides the above, my attention has also been called to 

 another undescribed species of remarkable delicacy and 



