APHYLLON UNIFLORUM. ONE-FLOWERED BROOM-RAPE. 



91 



might receive additional strength in the case of this Aphyllon, for 

 it is not probable that the ancestors of any modern parasitic 

 plant had originally parasitic habits. A tree or foster-plant must 

 be formed first before a parasite has anything to live on, even in 

 the strictest sense in which we may view the order of creation; 

 and with the modern geological views of time there is no diffi- 

 culty in believing that parasites came into existence long after the 

 plants on which they feed. 



The absence of leaves on the parts seen above ground sug- 

 gested its botanical name Aphyllon, which is Greek literally for 

 "without leaves." The earliest authors thought it a true Broom- 

 rape, or Orobanche; but Dr. John Mitchell, an early botanist of 

 Virginia, sent, in i 740, to Peter Collinson, of London, a paper in 

 which he proposed to make thirty new genera of Virginia plants, 

 and he proposed to divide this from Orobanche, and make it a 

 separate genus as Aphyllon. It does not seem to have been 

 approved by his contemporaries, for Gronovius, in his second 

 edition of " Flora Virginica," published in 1762, makes ''Aphyllon 

 of Mitchell" but a synonym of his " Orobanche caule unifloro," 

 the practice of having a single specific name as well as a generic 

 one not having then been adopted. In time the difference 

 from Orobanche was recognized, and it came to be known as 

 PhelypcEa, Gyninocanlis, Anoplon, and Anoplanthus, under which 

 with Orobanche it will yet have to be traced in European works; 

 but American botanists of. the present day are properly ruled 

 by the law of priority, and this decided Dr. Gray to go back to 

 the oldest name, which is Aphyllon of Dr. Mitchell. 



The manner in which our Aphyllon is distributed is among the 

 very interesdng facts connected with its history. Usually the 

 species of parasitic plants are not remarkable for being widely 

 scattered, but this is found over a vast extent of territory. 

 Clayton, in his notes of the Flora of Virginia, published by Gro- 

 novius, pronounced it "very rare," and perhaps few botanists 

 ever observed it covering any large space in any one location, 

 and yet there is scarcely a collector in any part of the United 



