242 



PITTONIA. 



except tlie very short and strictly erect flowering braiicbes. 

 The foliage also is of another outline, is perfectly entire as 

 well as glabrous, and does not in the least blacken in drying. 

 It is a very beautiful alpine dwarf, the flowers usually exceed- 

 ing in size all the rest of the plant that is above ground. 



P. Xewberkyi, Gray, Pac. R. Kep. vi. 82. t. 14 (1857). In 

 that complicated aggregate of Dr. Gray which he called P. 

 -Mcnziesii, even this was included, as a var. Newherryi, 

 although it is an excellent species, exclusively Californian; 

 but it is not, as he thought, the only Californian plant of this 

 group. It is distiugaisha])le most readily from the other 

 members above described, by the brilliant carmine red of its 

 corolla, the color of which Dr. Gray had been led to suppose 

 was only "pink-red" or "rose-red." It is a many times 

 larger plant, and has a much ampler and thinner foliage than 

 P. Menziesii, and this is usually glabrous and sometimes 

 glaucous. Moreover the corolla has a much narrower tube 

 and throat than are seen in any of the foregoing, and the 

 anthers are exserted. The slender raceme is peduncled, the 

 peduncle bearing several pairs of bracts. The habitat of the 

 species is alpine, near the line of permanent snow-drifts in 

 the higher Sierra Nevada, from Mt. Shasta southward beyond 

 the middle sections of the State. 



P. SoNOMENSis, Greene, Pitt ii. 218 (1891). So near is 

 this to the last that its broader and often obcordate leaves, 

 and quite sessile flower clusters are the only striking differ- 

 ences brought out by a comparison of the dried specimens; 

 though the anthers are not exserted, and the corolla is less 

 slender. It may also disclose some other differences of form 

 when seen in the fresh state. But the habitat of this plant 

 18 very different from that of the other. It is neither alpine 

 nor subalpine. The summit of Hood's Peak (in the Coast 

 iLange) seldom holds snow even in the winter months, while 

 in summer it is dry and hot, like the summits of St. Helena, 

 Diablo, and other peaks which rise up among the coast hills 





