PLATYSTEMON AND ITS ALLIES. 193 
cated var. nutans, which would include all the several species, 
whether of the mainland or of the outlying islands, which 
happen to have a nodding fruit; the abundant specific 
characters of the several members of the group being of 
course ignored ; even the specimens probably never collated 
or.compared. P. nutans is very near its upland neighbor, 
P. verecundus, and if I hold them distinct, it is more on account 
of the differences of habit, foliage and pubescence than of 
those of the merely torulose and ultimately separated carpels; 
for in this particular they are somewhat confluent. But 
between the several insular species and P. nutans there is no 
such intimate relation. 
50. P. nisprputus. Only 3 inches high, diffuse and leafy ; 
peduncles not longer than the leafy branches, nodding in 
fruit: leaves less than an inch long, remotely hispid-ciliate, 
usually otherwise glabrous: peduncles sparsely setose-hispid, 
but sepals of the obovate bud short-prickly: corolla about 4 
inch broad, apparently white, petals cuneate-obovate: fila- 
ments spatulate-linear, obtuse: carpels only 6 or 7, about 4 
lines long in maturity, 4 or 5 jointed with short deep con- 
Strictions, the joints smooth, each with 1 or 2 ascending 
aculex; styles nearly obsolete; stigmas short, linear. 
San Nicolas Island, remotest of the coast islands of Cali- 
fornia, April, 1897, Mrs. Trask. The plant is said to abound 
there, on sandy flats near the sea. 
~ 51. P. cernuus. Decumbent, much branched and leafy, 
3 to 8 inches high, the branches stout, but the comparatively 
short peduncles slender, these and the linear obtuse leaves 
loosely hirsute: corolla white or cream-color, ł inch broad, 
rotate, deciduous: filaments linear, tapering to a filiform base: 
carpels 14 to 16, in maturity only } inch long, more or less 
strongly villous-hirsute above the middle, more apt to be 
