Caprifoliaceae. 



355 



Linnaea. Twinflower. 

 (Family Caprifoliaceae). 



Low trailing and rooting 

 shrubs with finally exfoliating 

 red-brown bark: evergreen. Twigs 

 almost filiform, terete: pith 

 minute. Buds solitary, sessile, 

 oblong, appressed, minute and con- 

 cealed by the dilated petiole, with 

 2 valvate scales. Leaf-scars op- 

 posite, much raised and shriveled, 

 the single bundle-trace obscured: 

 stipules or stipule-scars lacking. 

 Leaves small, obovate-orbicular, 

 crenate, their petioles meeting 

 transversely. 



Winter-characters of Linnaea 

 borealis are given by Bbsemann, 

 37; and Fant, 51. 



I^^N Though the American twin- 



flower, Linnaea borealis ameri- 

 cana, or L. americana, differs 

 characteristically from its Euro- 

 pean representative, typical L. borealis, the distinction is not 

 readily made out except when flowers are present. 

 Sparingly white-hairy. L. borealis. 



Linnaea presents the seeming anomaly of a genus dedi- 

 cated to himself by its author. Under international conven- 

 tion the nomenclature of flowering plants dates from the 

 publications of the great author of the binomial system of 

 designating plants. Linnaea was published by Linnaeus in 

 his Genera Plantarum in 1737, and embodied in his Species 

 Plantarum in 1753. He appears to have been extremely fond 

 of the dainty little plant; but his friend Gronovius, and not 

 he, named it in his honor. 



