240 COMPOSITE. (COMPOSITE FAMILY.) ' 



serrate, veiny; disk-flowers 16-24, the rays 12-16. Rocky and wooded 

 hills, Maine and W. Vermont to Pennsylvania, and the mountains of Virginia : 

 rather rare. 



2. VIRGAtlREA, Tourn. Scales of the involucre destitute of herbaceous tips: 



rays mostly fewer than the disk-flowers : heads all more or less pedicelled. 



* Heads clustered in the axils of the feather-veined leaves. 



2. S. bicolor, L. Hoary or grayish with soft hairs ; stem mostly simple ; 

 leaves oblong or elliptical-lanceolate, acute at both ends, or the lower oval and 

 tapering into a petiole, slightly serrate ; dusters or short racemes from the axils of 

 the upper leaves, forming an interrupted spike or crowded panicle; rays small, 

 cream-color or nearly white. Var. CONCOLOR has the rays yellow. Dry copses 

 and banks : the var. in Pennsylvania and westward. 



3. S. Iatif61ia, L. Smooth or nearly so, stem angled, zigzag, simple or 

 paniculate-branched (l-3 high) ; leaves broadly ovate or oval, very strongly and 

 sharply serrate, conspicuously pointed at both ends (thin, 3' -6' long) ; heads in very 

 short axillary clusters, or somewhat prolonged at the end of the branches. 

 Moist shaded banks : common northward, and along the mountains. 



4. S. Cfesia, L. Smooth; stem terete, mostly glaucous, at length much 

 branched and diffuse; leaves lanceolate or oblong-lanceolate, serrate, pointed, 

 sessile; heads in very short clusters, or somewhat racemose-panicled on the 

 branches. Moist rich woodlands : common. 



* * Racemes terminal, erect, either somewhat simple and wand-like, or compound and 



panicled, not one-sided: leaves feather-veined. (Not maritime.) 



*- Heads small: leaves nearly entire, except the lowerwost. 



5. S. virgata, Michx. Very smooth throughout ; stem strict and simple, wand- 

 like (2 -4 high), slender, beset with small and entire appressed lanceolate-ob- 

 long thickish leaves, which are gradually reduced upwards to mere bracts ; the 

 lowest oblong-spatulate ; heads crowded in a very narrow compound spicate raceme; 

 rays 5-7. Damp pine barrens, New Jersey and southward. 



6. S/ pub^rula, Nutt. Stem (l-3 high, simple or branched) and pan- 

 icle minutely hoary ; stem-leaves lanceolate, acute, tapering to the base, smoothish ; the 

 lower wedge-lanceolate and sparingly toothed ; heads very numerous and crowded 

 in compact short racemes forming a prolonged and dense narrow or pyramidal panicle ; 

 scales of the involucre linear-awl-shaped, appressed; rays about 10. Sandy soil, 

 Maine to Virginia and southward, near the coast. 



7. S. Stricta, Ait. Very smooth throughout; stem simple, strict (2 -3 

 high) ; leaves lanceolate, pointed, the lower tapering into winged* petioles, partly 

 sheathing at the base, minutely serrate above with appressed teeth ; racemes much 

 crowded and appressed in a dense wand-like panicle ; scales of the involucre linear- 

 oblong, obtuse ; rays 5-6, small. Peat-bogs, Maine to Pennsylvania, Wis- 

 consin, and northward. Root-leaves 6' -10' long. Flowers earlier than most 

 species, beginning in July. 



-- H Heads rather large, at least for the size of the plant. 



8. S. specibsa, Nutt. Stem stout (3 -6 high), smooth; leaves thickish, 

 smooth with rough margins, oval or ovate, slightly serrate, the uppermost oblong- 

 lanceolate, the lower contracted into a margined petiole ; heads somewhat 



