PARRY CEANOTHUS. 1 67 



I should not hesitate to award the palm to the Santa Cruz range of 

 mountains, where, in a few hours' climb, are brought to view such 

 charming groups as C. incanus, C. papillosus, C. Andersoni, and C. 

 thxrsiflorus, with its occasional hybrids, vying with each other in dis- 

 playing the most refined tints of white or blue, or expanding into the 

 clear atmosphere of early spring their delicate feathered plumes. 



In the Cerastes section — almost peculiar to California — with their 

 rigidly coriaceous, usually opposite leaves, there is still more tendency 

 to aggregate in massed growths, but in such cases the thickets are 

 mainly composed of single separate species, and, therefore, less subject 

 to hybridization. 



The confusion of specific forms, due to hybridization, admits of an 

 easy solution in the field, where, by extended observation, each sepa- 

 rate species can be studied in its undisturbed condition. Thus, if Mr. 

 Howell, the active and intelligent botanical collector of Oregon and 

 Washington Territory, would extend his observations only by a few 

 hours' travel, as far as the central range of the Sierras, and the Sacra- 

 mento Valley, he would not venture his opinion that he "is disposed to 

 regard C. prostratus as only a variety of C. cuneatus." 



In the accompanying list I have briefly indicated, by locality, the 

 geographical range of such species as have come under my personal 

 observation, but the data are yet wanting for determining accurately 

 the range of all the species here represented. 



In submitting a synoptical arrangement of the thirty-three species 

 herewith enumerated, I have endeavored to bring them into simple, 

 natural groups, without any attempt at elaborate classification, such, in 

 fact, as they appear from the standpoint of a field observer. If varying 

 in this respect from that of more studied efforts, I can only say, I write 

 as I have seen. To the separate species in the numbered list, I have 

 only added notes of such as are imperfectly known or needing correc- 

 tion, with fuller descriptions of several new species; referring to the 

 well-known systematic writers on this genus, for the synonomy and lit- 

 erature of the same. 



CEANOTHUS, L. 



SYNOPTICAL LIST OF SPECIES. 



A. § Eu-ceanothcs. Branches flexible or rigidly spinose; leaves 

 alternate, deciduous, or persistent for two years or more, pliable or 

 sub-rigidly coriaceous, entire, crenately serrate or glandular-ciliate, triple- 

 nerved from the base, or penni-nerved ; stipules slender membranaceous, 

 usually fugaceous; inflorescence axillary or terminal, compact or loosely 



