188 COMPOSITE. (COMPOSITE FAMILY.) 



* Chaffy bracts of the receptacle soft and scarious : akenes with some long viHous 



hairs on the margins and sometimes on the faces. 

 H- Heads showy, large or middle-sized, solitary, or some later ones axillary : bracts 



of the involucre loose and lanceolate-attenuate or linear, more or less foliaceous, 



conspicuously hirsute-ciliate : disk yellowish. 



1. H. quinquenervis, Gray. Somewhat hirsutely pubescent or almost 

 glabrous : stems solitary or scattered, 2 to 4 feet high : leaves mostly opposite, 

 oblong- or ovate-lanceolate, acuminate, 4 to 9 inches long, uppermost sessile, lower 

 ones tapering into margined petioles, and the lowest (afoot or more long) into 

 longer petioles : head mostly long-peduncled, ample, the disk a full inch in 

 diameter : rays 15 to 20, pale yellow, commonly inch and a half long: pappus 

 of 2 slender awns, of half the length of the akene, and nearly thrice the length of 

 the squamellce, which form a conspicuous finely dissected fringe. Proc. Am. 

 Acad. xix. 10. H. unijlora of the Fl. Colorado and Bot. King's Exp. Moun- 

 tains from Dakota and Montana to S. Colorado. 



2. H. Parryi, Gray. Hispidulous-hirsute : stems numerous from a thick- 

 ened root, a foot high, rather slender : leaves mostly alternate, more rigid, lanceo- 

 late and an inch or two long, or the lowest and radical oblong-spatulate and of 

 double the size : heads and rays barely half the size of the preceding : pappus of 

 jimbriately dissected squamellw only, or with a pair of slender awns not surpass- 

 ing these. Proc. Acad. Philad. 1863, G8. Mountains of Colorado and New 

 Mexico. 



i- -i- Heads small : involucre more imbricated : rays few and hardly surpassing 

 the dark purple disk. 



3. H. microoepliala, Gray. Hispidulous-scabrous : stems numerous 

 from a greatly thickened root, a foot or less high, slender, somewhat panicu- 

 lately or corymbosely branched at summit and bearing several heads : leaves 

 rigid, all but the lower alternate ; radical lanceolate-spatulate ; upper cauline 

 nearly linear and sessile, an inch long : involucral bracts linear-oblong, mostly 

 obtuse : rays not over 3 lines long : pappus of several slender squamellae inter- 

 mixed with the long hairs, two marginal ones often extended and awn-like. 

 Proc. Am. Acad. xix. 10. Borders of Colorado and adjacent New Mexico and 

 Utah. 



* * Chaffy bracts of the receptacle Jirm-chartaceous : stems afoot or two high. 



4. H. tmiflora, Torr. & Gray. Minutely pubescent or glabrate : leaves 

 more commonly opposite, sometimes all alternate, oblong-lanceolate, 2 to 5 

 inches long; lower short-petioled : involucre pubescent or slightly hirsute: 

 rays a full inch long : akenes more or less ciliate : pappus a pair of long awns 

 and rather conspicuous squamellae. Gray, Proc. Am. Acad. xix. 10. //. multi- 

 caulis of Bot. King's Exp. Mountains of Montana and E. Idaho to S. Utah. 



41. VERBESINA, L. 



Flowers yellow or rarely white. Ours belongs to Ximenesia, in which the 

 heads are broad, the involucre of spreading linear and foliaceous equal bracts, 

 and the disk and receptacle merely convex : the rays are numerous and con- 

 spicuous. 



