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PLANTiE WRIGHTIAN^ 



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woody, corymbosely branched above ; the branches leafy to tbe top. Petioles sbort : 

 rhachis sparingly glandular, and usually with a pair of larger glands at the insertion 

 of the leaflets. Leaflets commonly 11 or 13, thickish, 3 lines long, remarkably sil- 

 very and shining, especially above, with a close and fine silky pubescence. * Pedun- 

 cles short. Spikes 12 - 20-flowered, at first capitate. Calyx rather longer than the 

 bract. Corolla showy, and large in proportion to the calyx ; the wings and keel 

 bright reddish-purple, on slender exserted claws, the lamina of the keel-petals a 

 quarter of an inch long ; the wings rather smaller : vexillum shorter, orbiculate, cu- 

 cullate and infundibular at the base, yellow, becoming tinged with purple in fading. 

 A handsome species, very different from any other North American one, but ap- 

 parently allied to the Mexican D. argentea of Martius. 



132. D. poGONATHERA ( Gr^3^, P/. Fendl. p. 31): pusilla, herbacea, glaberrima; 

 caulibus e radice perenni plurimis adscendentibus ; foliolis 5-7 oblongo-linearibus 

 subtus rhachique grosse nigro-glandulosis ; spicis oblongis densifloris; bracteis 

 ovatis cymbiformibus acuminato-cuspidatis glabris dorso parce glanduliferis margi- 

 nibus late scariosis tubo calycis sericeo-villosi sequilongis persistentibus ; dentibus 

 calycis setaceis plumosissimis tubo longioribus ; petalis dihite purpureis ; staminibus 

 10. — Pass of the Limpia; also along the Eio Grande, in Southern Texas; Aug. 

 The stems are slender, seldom more than a span high ; the full developed spikes only 

 an inch long, and densely flowered. The setaceous teeth of the calyx are always 

 longer than the tube, and in fruit about twice its length (a quarter of an inch long). 

 Wings longer than the vexillum, shorter than the keel. Legume and lower part of 

 the style villous. — D. laxiflora (to which belongs D. penicillata, Moricand, as the 

 inspection of Berlandieran specimens reassures me) is perfectly distinguished by its 

 taller and upright growth and bushy habit, its elongated and lax spikes, its coria- 

 ceous, orbiculate-dilated, thickly black-glandular bracts with narrower scarious mar- 

 gins and a shorter mucro, its smaller and yellow corolla, and its uniformly nine 



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stamens. 



133. D. LAsiATHERA (sp. nov.) : humilis, glaberrima; caulibus e radice perenni 

 assurgentibus herbaceis ; foliolis 7 - 13 (saepius 11) oblongo-linearibus retusis sub- 

 tus rhachique grosse glandulosis ; spicis cylindricis densifloris ; bracteis orbiculari- 

 ovatis cuspidato-acuminatis cymbseformibus glabris dorso grosse glanduliferis mar- 

 ginibus scariosis calyce sericeo-pubescente paulo brevioribus persistentibus ; denti- 

 bus calycis subulatis tubo brevioribus confertim villosisj petalis puniceis; stamini- 

 bus 10. — Prairies, west of San Antonio, Texas, and valley of the Limpia ; Aug. 

 Also in the coll. of 1851. (On the Liano, Western Texas, Lindheimer^ Pl. Lindh. 

 2.p. 174, where the specimen was wrongly referred to D. pogonathera.) — This spe- 

 cies in the smaller states resembles the foregoing ; but it is stouter and larger in all 

 its parts ; thc stems from a span to a foot high ; the leaflets somewhat more numer- 

 ous ; the dense spikes become two or three inches long in fruit ; the calyx-teeth are 

 subulate, much shorter, and thickly villous with shorter and rather appressed hairs, 

 so that they do not appear plumose ; and the showy, purple-red corolla is consider- 

 ably larger. The petals are nearly of the same relative proportion in these two 

 species and D. laxiflora; and the ovary and lower part of the style are villous in all 





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