192 BORRAGINACE^. . Eritrichium. 



from a corresponding deep cavity of the side of the gyndbase, and persists on the 

 nutlet in place of the ordinary areola or scar (when only one nutlet matures it 

 becomes incumbent) : seed amphitropous, attached above the middle of the cell : 

 herbage villous-hirsute : calyx in the original species at length circumscissile 

 above the base ! — Plagiobotlwys, Fisch. & Meyer, Ind. Sem. Petrop. 1835, 46; 

 not well characterized, the fruit being probably immature. 



* (GE^'UINA.) Mature nutlets very concave ventrally; the caruncle narrow and projecting, usually 

 oval, each tittiny into an orbicufar cavity of the globular gynobase: low annuals, with small 

 flowers, and villous or silky-hirsute but not hispid calyx. 



-1^ Nutlets dull or slightly shining, cartilaginous or coriaceous; the lines or ribs narrow and ele- 

 vated, bounding depressed areola;; the dorsal keel more or less salient. 



E. flilvum, A.DC. A span to a foot high, slender, branched from the leafy base, loosely 

 Jiirsute or merely pubescent: leaves linear or the lower and larger lanceolate or spatulate; 

 the upper sparse and small: spikes at maturity nearly filiform, bracteate only at base: 

 calyx, &c., densely clothed with dark-ferruginous and some merely fulvous hairs, circum- 

 scissile from the mature fruit ; the lobes narrow-lanceolate : limb of corolla 2 lines in 

 diameter: nutlets (a line long) rugose with broad and shallow areolations. — Prodr. x. 132 ; 

 Gray, 1. c. 57. Myosotls fulva, Hook. & Arn. Bot. Beech. 38 (the Chilian plant, which has 

 rather longer and narrower calyx-lobes), & 369. Plagiobothrys rufescens, Fisch. & Meyer, 

 1. c ; A.DC. 1. c. 1.34. P. canescens, Gray, Proc. Am. Acad. viii. 397 (no. 411, Hall). — Open 

 grounds, California and Oregon, toward the coast. (Chili.) 



B. canescens, Gray, 1. c. Stouter and generally larger than the preceding, leafy, vil- 

 lous-hirsute; the pubescence whitish, even that of the calyx barely fulvous : leaves linear: 

 calyx larger and with broader lanceolate lobes, less closed over the fruit and hardly if at all 

 circumscissile : nutlets usually with more prominent transverse ribs. — Plagiobothrys ca- 

 nescens, Benth. PI. Hartw. 826. — W. California and north to the Columbia River. 



-t— -i— Nutlets crustaceous, vitreous-shining or enamel-like at maturity ; the lines bounding the 

 long transverse and closely packed rugie very .slender and impressed: low plants, seldom a 

 span high: limb of corolla a line or two in diameter: calyx hardly if at all circumscissile at 

 maturity. 



E. tenellum, Gray, 1. c. Hirsute with rather soft hairs ; those of the calyx iriore or less 

 fulvous or rusty-yellowish : stems slender and erect : radical leaves in a rosulate tuft, 

 oblanceolate or broadly linear; the cauline rather few and small: spike few-flowered and 

 interrupted, leafy only at base : calyx-lobes triangular-lanceolate : nutlets (a line long) 

 very shining, somewhat cruciate from the abrupt contraction at both base and apex, hol- 

 lowed on the ventral face, the close and straight transverse wrinkles either smooth or 

 sparsely and sharply muricate. — E.fnlrnm, Watson, Bot. King, 243 ; Gray, Proc. Am. Acad, 

 viii. 397, not A.DC. Myosntis (Dasymorpha) tenella, Nutt. in Hook. Kew Jour. Bot. v. 296. 

 — Northern California ta British Columbia, Nevada, and Idaho. 



E. Torreyi, Gray, 1. c. More hispidly hirsute, the hairs even of the calyx greyish, much 

 branched from the root : stems diffuse or decumbent, leafy ; the flowers mainly leafy- 

 bracteate : leaves broadly oblong : nutlets rather larger than in the preceding and less 

 shining, broadly ovate, not cruciate nor muricate but smooth (or next the margins obscurely 

 tuberculate), the straight wrinkles rather broader ; caruncle not projecting. — California, 

 Sierra Nevada, near Yosemite Valley, Torrey. Sierra Valley, Lemmon; the latter a de- 

 pressed and very leaf}' form, with scattered flowers, accompanied throughout by leaves. 



* * (Ambigua.) Mature nutlets moderately incurved, affixed to the obtusely conical or pyra- 

 midal gynobase by a vertical narrow crest (answering to the caruncle) which occupies the middle 

 third of the concave face of tlie nutlet (terminating above in the sharp ventral keel which ex- 

 tends to the apex); the cavities of the gynobase oblong-ovate in outline: calyx, &c., more or less 

 setose-hispid. 



E. Kingii, "Watson. Apparently biennial, villous-hirsute and more or loss hispid : stems 

 a span or so high, rather stout : leaves from spatulate or oblong to spatulate-linear : inflo- 

 rescence at first thyrsoid ; the flowers in short spikes or clusters which are commonly leafy 

 at base : tube of the corolla not longer than the lanceolate calyx-lobes ; its limb 4 lines in 

 diameter, or sometimes one-half smaller : nutlets coriaceous, dull, irregularly rugose, not 

 distinctly carinate on the back, fully a line long. — Bot. King, 243, t. 23 (in flower) ; Gray, 

 Proc. Am. Acad. x. 60, & Bot. Calif, i. 628. — Eastern portion of the Sierra Nevada, in Ne- 



