OBSERVATIONS ON THE COMPOSITE. 75 



been employed by Poiret in 1811 for a genus of grasses. In 

 the same year in which Rafinesque proposed his Diplogon, 

 Nuttall indicated the same plants as forming a subgenus of 

 Inula, assigning as a subgeneric name Chrysopsis; and 

 this, in 1824, was taken up by Elliott as the name of that 

 genus of which Inula Maria7ia, Linn., is the earliest type. 



Confirmed by DeCandolle in the Prodromus in 1838, Chry- 

 sojjsis was at last accepted as a genus by Kuttall himself in 

 1840; and it has since then pretty well maintained its place 

 in the list of defensible asteroid genera. And, while it may 

 be safe to say that these plants are less foreign to Aster, 

 than are some genera which Dr. Kuntze has sought to 

 merge in that genus, he nevertheless maintains Chrysopsis, 

 though under the unavailable name of Diplogon; so much 

 stress does he lay upon the circumstance of a small some- 

 what paleaceous outer pappus. Bentham, and also Gray, 

 seem to have accepted this as the real geueric character; but 

 Lessing, in 1830, on account just this character, had referred 

 Chrysopsis to Diplopappus. On the whole, both the status 

 of the genus and the stability of the name Chrysopsis, are 

 seemingly somewhat precarious. Por example— receding to 

 the year 1813, we find that upon a certain West American 

 type now everywhere received as congeneric with luula 

 Mariana, Linn., Nuttall attempted to found a genus Sider- 

 anthus; and while some will regard this as nomen nudum, 

 others may, with some show of reason, incline to accept 

 Sideranthus as a published genus dating from Eraser's 

 Catalogue. Thus Sideranthus might supplant Chrysopsis. 

 Again: M. Baillon considers these types all congeneric with 

 the South American Hysierionica published by Willdenow 

 as early as 1807. I have not yet had the satisfaction of see- 

 ing specimens of the typical species of this genus; but Mr. 

 Bentham maintains the group as generically distinct from 

 Chrysopsis by a somewhat different habit, less copious pap- 

 pus, broader style-appendages, and its South Brazilian 



habitat. And even M 



admits 



that the ray-corollas are much more numerous and narrower 



