Amsonia. APOCYNACEiE. 81 



1. VALiLESIA, Ruiz & Pav. {Francis Vallesio, a Spanish physician.) — 

 Glabrous shrubs ; ■nith alternate leaves, and small terminal or soon lateral cymes 

 of small flowers. Calyx not glanduliferous within. — Prodr. Fl. Per. 28, t. 5. — 

 The principal species is — 



V. glabra, Cav. Leaves coriaceous and somewhat fleshy, shining, ahnost veinless, 

 oblong or oblong-lanceolate, acute, short-petioled, about 2 inches long : corolla white, o lines 

 long : drupes half inch long, dry, slender, often single. — Ic. iii. t. 297. V. dic/iotoma, Ruiz & 

 Pav. (Fl. Per. ii. 20, t. 151 j" & V. rhhcocroides (HBK.) ; A. DC. Prodr. viii. 349. — Key West, 

 Florida. (W. Ind. to Lower Calif, and Chili.) 



2. AMSONIA, Walt. (Dedicated to Charles Amson.) — Perennial herbs (E. 

 North America and Japan) ; with very numerous membranaceous and alternate 

 leaves, varying from ovate to linear, and rather compact small cymes of blue or 

 bluish flowers in a terminal thyrsus : fl. spring and early summer. Inside of the 

 tube of the corolla below the stamens beset with reflexed hairs. Liber of tough 

 fibres, as in Apocymim, &c. 



§ 1. Stigma with depressed-capitate or truncate entire apex: corolla not con- 

 stricted under the limb : eastern species. 



A. Tabernaeraontana, Walt. About 3 feet high, glabrate: leaves from ovate to 

 lanceolate, acuminate (2 to 5 inehes long), distinctly petioled, pale beneath : calyx very 

 small : corolla in the bud slender-beaked by the convolute limb ; its lobes lanceolate, 

 becoming linear and as long as the tube ; the latter at first mostly villous at the enlarging 

 summit : follicles slender, 2 or 3 inches long. — Car. 98; A. DC. Prodr. viil. 385. [Tabernx- 

 montana Amsonia, L.) A. JatifoUa, Miclix. Fl. i. 121 ; Bot. Reg. t. 151. A.'tristis, Smith in 

 Kees Cycl. A. saUdfolki, Pursli, Fl. i. 184 ; Bot. Mag. 1. 1873 ; A.DC. 1. c, witli var. ciliolata. 

 — Low grounds, N. Carolina and Illinois to Florida and Texas. 



A. angustifolia, Miclix. Stems (1 to 3 feet high) and commonly inflorescence and 

 leaves (or at least their margins) when young villous witli loose hairs, these deciduous : 

 leaves much crowded, linear-lanceolate to narrowly linear (an incli or two long, half line 

 to 4 lines wide), indistinctly petioled, the margins at length somewhat revolute : calyx 

 small and short : corolla glabrous outside; its funnelforjn tube (3 or 4 lines long) little 

 longer than the ovatc-oblong or at length linear-oblong lobes : follicles sknder and even, 

 2 to 5 inelies long. — Fl. i. 121 ; Pursh, 1. c. Tabermv montana angustifolia, Ait. Kcw. ed. 1, 

 i. 300 (1789). Amsonia ciliata, Walt. Car. (1788), 98 ; A.DC. 1. c. ; Chapm. Fl. 360 ; a decep- 

 tive specific name, and barely tlie older. — Dry soil, N. Carolina to Florida and Texas. 



Var. Texana. A foot or two high from creeping woody subterranean shoots, com- 

 pletely glabrous : leaves of firmer texture, lanceolate-oblong to linear. — Texas, in rocky 

 prairies and at the base of limestone Iiills, Pope, LindJteimer, E. Hall, &c. 



§ 2. Stigma apiculate with two distinct obtuse lobes above the truncate body : 

 tube of the corolla clavate, being constricted (at least in bud) under the conspicu- 

 ously shorter limb: calyx deeply S-parted into slender-subulate lobes (2 or 3 

 lines long) : stems lower, more branching, and bearing smaller or simpler cymes : 

 western species. 



* Follicles torose, inclined to break into thickisli articulations: corolla rather short. 

 A. brevifolia, Gray. About a foot high, glabrous : leaves thickish, ovate, varying 

 above to lanceolate, nearly sessile by a narrowed base (8 to 18 lines long) : lobes of the 

 corolla ovate or becoming oblong, 2 or 3 lines long, nearly half the length of the tube ; 

 the throat bearded only within the constricted orifice : mass of the stigma between the 

 ring and the apical lobes longer than wide : follicles 2 or 3 inches long, thickish, irregu- 

 larly moniliform, chartaceous, and disposed to break into one-seeded joints. — Proc. Am. 

 Acad. xii. G4. — Southern Utah and W. Arizona to tlie border of California, Mrs. Thompson, 

 Parri], P(dmer. 

 A. tomentosa, Torr. A foot or more high, cinereous-tomentose or puberulent, varying 

 to glabrous : leaves from lanceolate to narrowly linear, sessile : lobes of the corolla oblong, 



6 



