Caltha. RANUNCULACE.E. 39 



Recently published species of uncertain affinities. 



R.* AlistinSB, Greene. " Perennial by a fascicle of coarse and long fleshy-fibrous roots: 

 stem and leaves glabrous, weak and rather succulent, the former 6 to 10 inches high ; radical 

 leaves few, of round-obovate outline, abruptly taperuig to the very long and slender petiole 

 or nearly truncate at base, and with mostly about five rather shallow terminal lobes, 

 some with three large and rather deeper lobes; cauline leaves cuneate-obovate, 3-lobed, 

 sessile : flowers solitary, on very long and slender peduncles, these few and terminal or sub- 

 terminal : petals white : stamens yellow, rather few : carpels puberulent, rounded, neitlier 

 compressed nor margined, tipped with a long and slender straigiit or nearly straight beak, 

 and arranged in an ovoid or more elongated head." — Erythea, iii. 44. — Crevices of lava 

 rock east of Willow Creek Valley^ N. Calif., Mrs. Austin. Description quoted from original 

 characterization. 



R.* alceus, Greene. " Less than a foot high, rather slender, freely branching, soft-hirsute 

 and villous but not canescent : leaves only about 1 inch long, on slender petioles, of ovate 

 general outline and in 3 divisions, the middle one stalked, all cuneiform and doubly cleft : 

 flowers very small, the round-obovate petals 5 only, barely a line long : akenes rather 

 numerous, obliquely obovoid, smooth, or with a faint venation, tipped with a stout recurved 

 beak, and forming a globose head." — Erythea, iii. 69. — Elk Mountain, Mendocino Co., 

 Calif., Jepson. Description quoted from the original characterization. 



10. CALTHA, L. Marsh Marigold. (Ancient Latin name of a 

 strong-sceuted plant, probably the true Marigold, Calendula. The common 

 derivation, originated by Linnaeus, is a mere conjecture.) — Perennial herbs, of 

 temperate and frigid regions, glabrous ; with a fascicle of strong fibrous roots, 

 simple leaves more or less rounded and cordate at base, and pedunculate showy 

 flowers, either solitary or several and cymosely clustered. — Gen. no. 463 ; Benth. 

 «fe Hook. Gen. i. &} 



* Leafy-stemmed : follicles sessile : flowering in early spring. 

 C. palustris, L. (Marsh Marigold, vulgarly called Coivslips.) Stem erect, commonly 

 robust, few-leaved, usually several-flowered : leaves from orbicular-cordate to reniform, from 

 dentate or crenate to entire : sepals 5 or 6, rarely 7, oval, half inch or more long, golden 

 yellow: anthers elongated-oblong. — Spec. i. 558; Gray, Gen. 111. i. 32, t. 10. C. palustris, 

 Jicarioides, & flabellifolia, Fursh, Fl. ii. 389, 390, the last (t. 17) a weak form in cold 

 mountain springs, with thinner open-reniform leaves and smaller flowers, approaching the 

 following var. — In wet ground, Atlantic U. S. east of the Mississippi, from the mountains 

 of Carolina and Tennessee northward to Newfoundland, thence west to Minnesota and 

 Saskatchewan; and in some forms to Alaska and the arctic coast but mainly as var. 

 (Eu., Asia.) 



Var. radicans, Gray, n. var. Stems becoming decumbent or procumbent and com- 

 monly rooting at the nodes, 1 -few-flowered : flowers either similar or smaller : leaves equally 

 various, oftener dilated-reniform, sometimes nearly truncate at base. — C. radicans, Forst. 

 Trans. Linn. Soc. viii. 324, t. 17. C. asarifolia, DC. Syst. i. 309. C. arctica, R. Br. in Parry, 

 1st Voy. Suppl. to App. 265, said to have linear anthers, but hardly so. C. palustris, var. 

 Sibirica, Regel, Bull. Soc. Nat. Mosc. xxxiv. pt. 2, 53, in part. — Subarctic and arctic 

 America, Melville Island to Alaska. (Scotland to Kamtsch., Japan, &c.) 

 C. natans, Pall. Stems prostrate or floating, rooting freely, with solitary or a few scattered 

 flowers : leaves round-reniform, crenulate or entire : sepals oval, 2 or 3 lines long, white or 

 tinged with rose : stamens few . anthers short-oval •. follicles not over 2 lines long, blunt or 

 mucronulate, forming a close glolmlar head. — Reise, iii. 284 (Gmel. Fl. Sibir. iv. 192, t. 82) ; 

 DC. 1. c. 311 ; R. Br. 1. c. 265 ; Lawson, Rev. Canad. Ranunc. 68. —Wet sphagnous bogs 

 and flowing water, Brit. America, Athabasca Plains 2 and northward. (N. Asia, Kamtsch.) 



1 Recent literature: G. Beck, K. K. zool. hot. Gesellsch. Verhandl. (Vienna), xxxvi. 347, 353. 

 E. Huth, Monogi-. in Helios, ix, 69-74, t. 1. 



2 Since collected at Tower, Minnesota, E. J. Hill, ami in Vermillion Lake, Sandbery. 



