42 POLYGALACEiE. 



Swamps. Can. to Flor. W. to Miss. Aug. Sept. %..—Siem 12—18 inches 

 high. Leaves mostly radical. Flowers large, yellowish white. 



Carolina Parnassus Grass. 



2. P. paliistris Linn.: leaves all cordate; cauline one sessile; scales 

 smooth, many bristled. 



Bog meadows. Labrador to N. Y. ? W. to the Rocky Mountains. Flowers 

 white, with veins of green or purple. Distinguished by the numerous, slender, 

 white, pellucid hairs of its scales from all the other species of the genus. 



Marsh Parnassus Grass. 



Order XVII. POLYGALACE^.— Milkworts. 



Sepals 5, very irregular, distinct, 3 exterior, of which 1 is 

 superior and 2 inferior ; 2 inner ones (the wings) usually peta- 

 loid. Petals hypogynous, mostly 3, of which the anterior {keel) 

 is larger than the rest, and usually crested or lobed. Stamens 

 8, usually in a tube ; anthers mostly 1 -celled, and opening by a 

 terminal pore. Ovary superior, 2-celled ; style and stigma sim- 

 ple. Fruit usually a capsule, sometimes indehiscent. Seeds 

 with abundant albumen. — Shrubs or herbaceous plants, with sim- 

 ple entire leaves destitute of stipules. Flowers mostly in ra- 

 cemes or spikes. 



POLYGALA. TM^m.— Milkwort. 



(From the Greek tto\v, much, and yaXa, milk ; from its supposed power of in- 

 creasing the secretion of milk.) 



Calyx of 5 sepals, 2 of them wing-shaped and colored. 



Petals 3 — 5, united to the stamens, the lower one keelform. 



Capsule compressed, elHptic, obovate or obcordate. Seeds 



pubescent. 



* Flowers in racemes or spikes. 



1. P. incarnata Linn.: glaucous; stem erect, slender, nearly simple; 

 leaves scattered, few, subulate ; racemes spiked, oblong, without glands ; 

 corolla with a long tube. 



N. J. to Flor. W. to Ark. Near Niagara Falls. Hook. June, July. (1)— 

 Stem 12—18 mches high, somewhat angled, with few remote subulate leaves. 

 Flowers flesh-colored, in a somewhat loose terminal spike. Petals united into a 

 long slender tube. A specimen of this plant, received from Dr. Charles Picker- 

 ing, and gathered by him in New Jersey, has only 4 or 5 subulate leaves on the 

 stem, which is more than a foot high. Flesh-colored Milkwort. 



2. P. cruciata Linn.: stem fastigiate, winged at tnc angles; leaves 

 whorled in fours, linear and linear-oblong, punctate ; spikes ovate, dense, 

 sessile or on short peduncles ; flowers subcristate ; wings deltoid-cordate, 

 acute or cuspidate. P. brevifolia and P.fastigiata Nutt. 



Swamps. Mass. to Flor. W. to Louis. Aug. Sept. ®.— S/m variable 

 in height, depending on situation. Spikes sometimes pedunculate. Flowers red 

 or purple. Cross-leaved Milkwort. 



