RANUNCULACE^. 309 



Van Houtte, Fl. Serr. t. 1188 (1857). Glabrous, or in soiitherly stations 

 notably puberulent, 1—3 ft. high: fl. IJg — 2 in. broad, red tinged with 

 yellow: sepals widely spreading or reflexed: petals truncate, the limb 

 very short: spurs % — % iii- long? thick and blunt. — Common in shady 

 ravines and on banks of streams. Apr., May, on the seaboard; June, 

 July, in the Sierra. 



2. A. leptocera, Nutt. Journ. Philad. Acad. vii. 9 (1834): A. carulea, 

 B. & W. Bot. Calif, i. 10, not James: A. macrantJia, H. & A. Bot. Beech, 

 t. 72 (1840). Neither as tall nor as branching as the above: fl. very large, 

 pale yellow; sepals spreading, 2—3 in.; spurs slender, 2—3 in. long; 

 pistils in the central earliest flowers commonly 7 or 8. — Woods of the 

 higher Sierra; equally related to A. ccenilea of the Rocky Mts., and to 

 A. chrysantha of Mexico, but distinct from both. June, July. 



13. THALICTRUM, Dioscorides (Meadow-Rue). Tall perennials, 

 often heavy -scented, with fibrous roots^ hollow stems, bi- or triternately 

 compound leaves, and many panicled greenish imperfect (dioecious) 

 flowers. Sepals 4—7, small, deciduous. Petals 0. Stamens oo, with 

 slender linear anthers on rather long almost capillary filaments. Pistils 

 few or many, becoming ribbed or veined achenes which are tipped with 

 the persistent beak-like style, and disposed in roundish head.s. 



1. T. polycarpum, Wats. Bot. Calif, ii. 424 (1880), partly. Stout, 3—4 

 ft. high, glabrous, not glaucous, aromatic-scented: leaves short-petioled 

 or sessile; leaflets with acute or acuminate lobes: sepals lanceolate, not 

 scarious: achenes very many in the head, broadly obovoid, short-stipitate, 

 compressed, turgid, the style abruptly curved, the sides marked with low 

 more or less anastomosing veins. — In open places near streams, chiefly in 

 the Coast Range above and below San Francisco. Easily recognized by 

 the peculiar aromatic odor, sharp-pointed leaf-lobes, and crowded heads 

 of large turgid achenes. May, June. 



2. T. csesiam. Tall as the last, but less robust, not at all aromatic, 

 glaucous throughout, even to the achenes: sepals oblong, obtuse, thin 

 and somewhat scarious-margined: achenes from nearly orbicular to 

 broadly lanceolate, veined as in the last, but not turgid. — Foothills of 

 the Sierra, from Calaveras Co. northward; common near Chico: also in 

 Lake Co., Mr. Whitmore. Apparently confused with T. polycarpum 

 hitherto, but occupying a different range, and very clearly distinct. 



3. T. hesperiniii, Greene, Pittonia, ii. 24 (1889): T. diuicwn, Boland. 

 Cat. 3 (1870), not Linn.: T. Fendleri, B. & W. Bot. Calif, i. 4 (1876) partly, 

 not Engelm.: T. Fendleri, var. platycarpum, Trel. Proc. Bost. Soc. xxiii. 

 304 (1886). Tall, scentless, glabrous except the growing parts and the 

 lower face of the leaves, which have a sparse minutely gland-tipped 



