SAXIFRAGE FAMILY. 135 



P. Gordoni^nUS, cult, from Oregon, is seemingly a variety of the last, 

 very tall, and the large flowers apijcaring at midsummer. 



P. hirsutUS, Hairy M. Wild in N. Car. and Tenn., sparingly cult. : 

 slender, with recurving branches, the small ovate and acute sharply-toothed 

 leaves hairy, and beneath even hoary ; the small white flowers solitary or 

 2-3 together at the end of short racemose side branchlets. 



5. DEUTZIA. (Named for one Detttz, an amateur botanist of Amsterdam. ) 

 Fine flowering shrubs of Japan and China, with numerous panicles of whito 

 blossoms, in late siiring and early summer ; the lower side of the leaves, the 

 calyx, &c. beset with minute starry clusters of hairs or scurf. 



D. gracilis, the smallest species, is 2° high, with lance-ovate sharply ser- 

 rate leaves bright green and smooth, and rather small snow-white flowers, earlier 

 than the rest, often forced in greenhouses ; filaments forked at the top. 



D. cren^ta. Commonly planted ; a tall shrub, rough with the fine pube- 

 scence, with pale ovate or oblong-ovate minutely crenate-serrate leaves, and 

 rather dull white blossoms in summer ; the filaments broadest upwards and 

 with a blunt lobe on each side just below the anther. This is generally cult 

 under the name of the next, viz. 



D. seabra, with more nigose and rougher finely sharp-serrate leaves, and 

 entire taper-jjointed filaments : seldom cult. here. 



6. HYDRANGEA. (Name of two Greek words meaning water and vase; 

 the application obscure.) Fl. summer. 



* Cultivated from China and Japan : house-plants N., turned out for summer. 



H. Hortensia, Common Hydrangea, is very smooth, with large and 

 oval, coarsely toothed, bright-green leaves, and the flowers of the cyme nearly 

 all neutral and enlarged, blue, purple, pink, or white. 



* * Wild species, on shadi/ hanks of rii-ers, Sj-c, hut often planted for ornament. 



Styles mostli/ onli/ 2 : flowers lohite, the sterile enlarged ones turning green- 

 ish or purplish loith age, pei'sistent. 



H. quercifblia, Oak-leaved H. Stout shrub 3° - 6° high, very leafy, 

 downy, with oval .5-lobed large leaves, and cymes clustered in oblong panicle, 

 with numerous sterile flowers. Wild from Georgia S., hardy N. in cult. 



H. radikta, called more fittingly 11. NfvEA, having the ovate or some- 

 what heart-shaped pointed leaves very white-woolly beneath, but smooth and 

 green above ; the flat cyme with a few enlarged sterile flowers round the mar- 

 gin. Wild S. of Virginia. 



H. arborescens, wild from Penn. and 111. S., rarely planted, is smooth, 

 with ovate or slightly heart-shaped serrate pointed leaves green both sides, the 

 flat cyme often without any enlarged sterile flowers, but sometimes with a full 

 row round the margin. 



7. PARNASSIA, GRASS-OF-PARNASSUS. Wild on wet banks; 

 the large white flower handsome, in summer and autumn. ^ 



P. Carolini^na, the only common species, both N. & S., has the sca))e or 

 stem \°-2° high, bearing one clasping leaf low down, and terminated with a 

 flower over 1' broad, the many-veined petals sessile, with 3 stout small sterile 

 filaments before each. 



P. palllStris, scarce on northern borders, is small throughout, with several 

 blender filaments before each few-veined petal. 



P. asarif61ia, along the Allcgbanies S., has rather kidney-shaped leaves, 

 and petals narrowed at base into a short claw ; otherwise like the first. 



8. HEUCHERA, ALUM-ROOT, the rootstock being astringent. (Named 

 for a German botanist, Ilcncher.) Wild plants of rocky woods, chiefly W. 

 and S. along the iniddle country ; the leaves rounded heart-shaped and more 

 or less lobed or cut, mostly from the rootstock, often one or two on the tall 

 stalk of the panicle. Flowers mostly greenish, in summer. ^ 



