Stillingia. EtfPHOKBIACE^E.' *J\ 



length nearly glabrous, a half to an inch long, on very short petioles ; stipules 

 subulate, caducous : spikes terminal or axillary, short ; the staminate 3 or 4 lines 

 long, nearly sessile, dense, with often a fertile flower at the base; the pistillate 

 3 - 8-flowered, crowded, at length more open and half an inch long or less : fertile 

 bracts reniform, finely toothed and strongly nerved, 2 lines broad, somewhat 

 enlarged in fruit : sepals 3, lanceolate, acute : ovary densely tomentose : styles with 

 lateral simple or forked branchlets : seed round-ovate, smooth and somewhat shin- 

 ing, nearly a line long. Bot. Sulph. 5 1 ; Mull. Arg. in 1)C. Prodr. xv 2 . 822. 



Bay of Magdalena, Lower California (Hinds) ; San Diego County, near the Boundary Monu- 

 ment, "on stream-banks," Palmer. The latter specimens are in an early flowering state, but re- 

 taining a matured fruiting spike ; the young leaves are all less than a half inch long. 



6. STILLINGIA, Garden. 



Flowers monoecious, in the axils of conspicuously 2-glandular bracts, in terminal 

 or rarely axillary spikes which are pistillate at base : involucre, petals and disk 

 none. Calyx imbricate in the bud ; the staminate 2 - 3-cleft or 3-parted, the pistil- 

 late 3-parted or wanting Stamens 2 or 3, distinct or nearly so, central ; filaments 

 exserted ; anthers erect in the bud, with adnate rounded cells. Ovary 3-celled, 

 3-ovuled : styles 3, filiform, entire. Lobes of the capsule deciduous from a stout 

 horizontal 3-horned base (gynophore), often without a central column. Seeds 

 smooth or roughened, usually carunculate. Radicle equalling the broad cordate 

 cotyledons. Smooth herbaceous or woody perennials, or some annual ; leaves 

 alternate, usually serrate, often 2-glandular at base ; pistillate flowers solitary, the 

 staminate 1 to 3 in each bract. Miill. Arg. in DC. Prodr. xv 2 . 1155. Gymno- 

 stilli>if/ia, Miill. 1. c. 1163. 



The genus as denned by Miiller includes about a dozen widely scattered species, all perennials, 

 of which two are found on the Atlantic coast, one of them ranging west into New Mexico and 

 Northern Mexico. His genus Gymnostillingia, to which the following species might be referred, 

 was founded upon two shrubby plants of Mexico and Guatemala, but the characters by which he 

 distinguishes it (the want of a calyx in the pistillate flowers, the solitary staminate flowers, and 

 the ecarunculate seed) seem hardly sufficient for more than a sectional or subgeneric division. 

 The closely allied Scbastiania, Spreng., is distinguished chiefly by the absence of the gynophore. 



* Perennials : spikes terminal : leaves narrow, entire or nearly so. 



1. S. linearifolia, Watson. Herbaceous, branching from the somewhat woody 

 base, a foot high or more: stems and branches slender, terete, ascending: leaves 

 linear, entire, or rarely very obscurely glandular-toothed, acute, a half to an inch 

 long: spikes very slender, open, 1 to 1| inches long, with 2 to 7 scattered pistillate 

 flowers below : bracts very small, ovate, acute, minutely glandular on each side, 

 1-flowered : staminate flowers very small ; calyx turbinate : stamens 2 : pistillate 

 calyx none : capsule 1 lines in diameter ; the horns of the gynophore rather thin, 

 and central column often persistent : seed round-ovate, acute, a line long, smooth, 

 somewhat viscid, not carunculate. Proc. Amer. Acad. xiv. 297. 



San Diego, near the Boundary Monument (Palmer, n. 449, 1875) ; San Bernardino County, 

 Parry & Lemmon, 1876, n. 376. 



2. S. paucidentata, Watson. Herbaceous, the stout angled stems branching 

 above : leaves linear, acuminate, an inch or two long with 2 or 3 setaceous teeth on 

 each side usually near the base : spikes slender, but stouter and denser than in the 

 last, with similar bracts and flowers ; the pistillate flowers more crowded : capsule 

 2 lines in diameter, with very prominent gynophore : seeds 1 lines long, oblong- 

 ovate, acute arid slightly carunculate, smooth. Proc. Amer. Acad. xiv. 298. 



Colorado Valley, near the mouth of Williams River, Palmer, 1876, n. 517. 



