IPOMCRA LACUNOSA. 



WHITE STAR IPOMQiA. 



NATURAL ORDKR, CONVOLVULACE.I';. 



Ii'OM't:.v LACUNOSA, T,inn?cus. — Minutely pubescent; stem twining; leaves cordate, acumi- 

 nate, aiigular-lubccl or entire, on long petioles; peduncle one to three-flowered, half ;.s 

 long as the petioles; sepals bristly ciliate, oblong-lanceolate, acute, half as lon<T as the 

 corolla; capsule pilous. Leaves two inches by one and one half inches, deeply cordate, 

 often deeply thrcc-lobcd, petioles one to three inches long. P'lowers about one inch long, 

 white with a purplish rim. (Wood's Class-Book of Botany. See also Chapman's I'Uyra 

 of the Soitthcrn United States, and Gray's Jlfamial of t/ie Botany of the A'orthern United 

 States.) 



?^S INN^US, in his " Genera Plantarum," says of tlie plants 

 i^Sl which belong to the genus Ipomcca, that tlicy are a kind 

 of Convolvulus or Bindweed, and it was the resemblance to the 

 latter genus which suggested the name to him. In Dr. Gray's 

 " Manual " we read : " Name, according to Linna?us, from ips, 

 ipos, a Bindweed (which it is not), and homoios, like." The re- 

 semblance is, indeed, quite striking, but a close examination will 

 readily show that the genus IponKra is distinct from tlie genus 

 Convolvulus, although the two are closely related, and both of 

 them are members of the same natural order. By some of the 

 earlier writers our species was actually regarded as a Couvolvti- 

 lus. Dillenius, for instance, who wrote in 1732, mentions it 

 under that name, and Alton refers to it as Convolvulus slcllatus, 

 or " Star-Flower," while according to Gray and Chapman, C. nii- 

 cranthus, or the Small-flowered Bindweed of RIddell, is a name 

 which belongs also to our plant. These synonyms apj^ear to 

 be the only ones of any consequence that maybe applied to the 

 species, and this is rather remarkable when wc remember how 



