WOOTON AND STANDLEY FLORA OF NEW MEXICO. 249 



great blossoms, sometimes six inches in diameter, look like bits of fallen sky, and 

 when the plants cover acres of meadow, as they sometimes do, no words can be found 

 to do them justice. On the Upper Pecos the Rocky Mountain columbine is very 

 abundant, especially in the parks near timber line. At Harveys Ranch in the Las 

 Vegas Mountains they were seen in great quantity in a grain field. Forms with light- 

 colored, almost white, flowers are not uncommon. 



4. CALTHA L. 



Glabrous perennial with oblong or oblong-ovate obtuse bright green leaves; sepals 

 5 to 9, petal-like, white inside, bluish without; pistils 5 to 10, with scarcely any styles; 

 pods compressed, spreading. 



1. Caltha leptosepala DC. Reg. Veg. Syst. 1: 310. 1818. Elkslip. 



Caltha leptosepala rotundifolia Iluth, Helios 9: 68. 1891. 



Caltha rotundifolia Greene, Pittonia 4: 80. 1899. 



Caltha chionophila Greene, loc. cit. 



Type locality: Prince William Sound, Alaska. 



Range: British America, along the Rockies to northern New Mexico. 



New Mexico: Santa Fe and Las Vegas mountains. Wet meadows, in the Hud- 

 Bonian and Arctic-Alpine zones. 



The plant is very common on the higher peaks of the northern part of the State, 

 growing in marshes about the small mountain lakes and in wet ground around snow- 

 banks. The flowers are very handsome, the sepals being almost white inside and 

 bluish outside, in color suggesting some of the water lilies. 



5. ACTAEA L. Cohosh. 



Perennial, with broad, twice or thrice ternately compound leaves, the leaflets 

 cleft and toothed; flowers in a short terminal raceme rising above the leaves; sepals 

 4 or 5, caducous; petals 4 to 10, small, spatulate, clawed, whitish; stamens numerous, 

 with slender, whitish or greenish filaments; pistil single, with a sessile depressed 

 2-lobed stigma. 



1. Actaea viridiflora Greene, Pittonia 2: 108. 1890. 



Type locality: "In open rocky places among the pine and spruce woods of Mt. 

 San Francisco, Arizona." 



Range: Colorado to Arizona and New Mexico. 



New Mexico: Tunitcha Mountains; Chama; Dulce; Santa Fe and Las Vegas 

 mountains; Sandia Mountains; Mogollon Mountains; Hillsboro Peak; White and 

 Sacramento mountains. Transition to Hudsonian Zone. 



It is possible that more than one species of the genus occurs in the State, but we are 

 unable to find any means of separating them, at least in herbarium material. In a 

 given locality forms with red and white berries occur, often growing together. The 

 plants are found on moist slopes, usually in thick shade. When in fruit they are 

 rather showy. 



6. MYOSURTJS L. Mousetail. 



Small annuals with linear entire basal leaves and simple 1-flowered scapes; sepals 

 5, spurred or appendaged at the base; petals 5, small, narrow, sometimes wanting, 

 clawed; stamens 5 to 20; achenes very numerous, spicate on a filiform receptacle. 



