‘SAPONARIA, CARYOPHYLLACES®. 75 
SILENE. 
8S. -Vaccarra ’L. Sp..409. Stem solitary from an annual root, erect, 1-4 
feet high, widely branching above: leaves ovate to oblong-lanceolate, ses- 
sile and somewhat connate at base; flowers in a broad corymb;~ calyx 
ovoid, with 5 sharp herbaceous angles, the intervening parts white and 
scarious: petals 'rose-color, without appendages. Common in cultivated 
grounds. Introduced from Europe. 
S. OFFICINALE L. Sp. 408. Stems numerous from a perennial root, 1-2 
feet high, stout: leaves ovate-lanceolate, acute, narrowed at the base, 2-3 
inches long, 3-ribbed: flowers clustered at the ends of the short branches, 
often double; calyx tubular, terete, with numerous faint nerves; petals 
white or pink, appendaged at the junction of the claws and obovate retuse 
blade. Roadsides and R. R. embankments. Introduced from Europe. 
2 SILENE L. Gen. n. 567. 
Annual or perennial herbs with mostly linear entire opposite 
leaves and white or red flowers in paniculate racemes: (rarely 
solitary or cymose). Calyx tubular more or less inflated, cylin- 
dro-clavate to campanulate, 5-toothed, 10-nerved. Petals 5, with 
slender claws, which are usually crowned with scales at their junc- 
tion with the mostly 2 to many-cleft blade. Stamens 10. Style 
3. Ovary stipitate. Capsule dehiscent by 6, rarely 3 short teeth. 
Seeds opaque, tuberculate or echinate, attached by the margin: 
embryo peripherical. . | 
* Annuals, mostly introduced. 
+ Inflorescence simply racemose or subspicate ; pedicels solitary. | 
S.. Gatuica L. Sp. 417. Stems hirsute with white jointed hairs: leaves 
spatulate, mucronate, hirsute-pubescent on both sides 8-18 lines long: ra- 
cemes terminal one-sided, 2-4 inches long: flowers more or less pedicel- 
late: calyx 10-nerved, villous-hirsute, slender, subcylindric in anthesis, " 
becoming in fruit. broadly ovoid with contracted orifice and short narrow 
spreading teeth: petals usually little exceeding the calyx; the blade ob-. 
ovate, somewhat’ bifid, toothed orentire. Along the coast from Brit. Co- 
lumbia to Lower California, 
VAR. QUINQUEVULNERA, Koch, Syn. Fl. Germ. et.: Hely. 100; Petals 
more. showy, subentire, deep. crimson with a white or pink border. . 
With the typical form. 
«+ + Inflorescence cymose or paniculate, not distinctly racemose. 
++ Smooth or nearly so, a part of the upper internodes glutinous. 
S. antirrhina L. Sp. 419. Stems slender, 6-36 high: leaves oblong-lan- 
ceolate or linear, commonly acute: flowers small in a compound cyme, on 
long filiform pedicels: calyx oblong-cylindric, smooth, in fruit ovoid with 
short teeth; petals obcordate, about equalling the calyx-teeth expanding only 
at night or in cloudy, weather; scales minute: ovary scarcely stiped. On dry 
hillsides, California to Brit. Columbia and across the continent. 
% * Very low and densely matted subcaulescent perennials. 
S. acaulis L. Sp. ed. 2, 603. Closely cespitose, an inch or two high: 
leayes linear, crowded on the branching caudex : flowers small, 2-3 lines in 
diameter, subsessile or raised on naked curved peduncles: calyx narrowly 
campanulate glabrous, the teeth short and rounded: petals purplish or 
white, minutely appendaged, obcordate, exserted: flowers dicecious by : 
abortion, Arctic America to the Cascade and Rocky Mountains. 
. * * * Caulescent perennials. 
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