NOETH AMERICAN NEILLLE. Vl 



in different parts of the country to a more thorough and a 

 better directed collecting of them. In the greater part of 

 the specimens, as they exist in our herbaria, I find no repre- 

 sentation o£ the foliage of growing shoots ; yet, these alone 

 baar tlis really normal and typical leaves. The flowering 

 and fruiting branchlets are in reality nothing more or less 

 than leafy peduncles. The leaves of these are always 

 reduced in si/.e, extremaly variable in outline and lubing, 

 and should no more be depended on in describing, than 

 should tli8 exactly corresponding peduncular leaves of a 

 leafy-peduncled willow or bramble. They are not the true 

 leaf-type of the shrub, but a kind of bracts rather, strictly 

 viewed, however conspicuous and plentiful they may be. 

 By taking note of the proper leaves, one seems to find con- 

 siderable differences of form and venation; these differences 

 appearing quite constant, how^ever slight, between the 

 different species. No specimen should be distributed as com- 

 plete, or reckoned upon as likely to be serviceable, unless a 

 fair portion of sterile main shoot accompany the flowering 

 or fruiting branchlets. 



The fruits, it will be seen, have evidently received little 



attention from recent American botanists. Even . the seeds, 

 the size of which as well as their inner structure, furnish 

 the main reasons for a separation between NeilUa and 

 Sptrcea, have external characters which are not to be ignored. 

 Of pubescence, even that of the carpels, less use can be made 

 than appears to have been allowed heretofore. 



Carpels inflated, exsevicd from the calyx, divergiiuj at 



apex, bivalvate'dehiscent. 



1. X. OPULiroLiA (Linn,), Watson, Bibliogr. Index, 29, 

 excluding tlie var. mollis and most of the references (1878) ; 

 Macoun,''Catal. Canad. 127, excl. var. (1883) ; Tracy, Catal. 

 PL Missouri, 28 (1SS3).; Dudley, Cayuga Fl. 28 (1886) ; 

 B. S. P. Torr. Club, Catal 15 (1888) ; Day, Fl. Niagara, 23 



'fi 



Mill 



