BIGNONIACE^E 



871 



The generic name is that by which one of the North American species was known among 

 the Cherokee Indians. 



CONSPECTUS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN SPECIES. 



Flowers in many-flowered crowded panicles; calyx glabrous; corolla thickly spotted on the 

 inner surface; fruit slender, thin-walled; leaves short-acuminate. 



1. C. bignonioides (C). 



Flowers in few-flowered open panicles; calyx often sparingly villose or pubescent; corolla 

 inconspicuously spotted; fruit stout, thick-walled; leaves caudate-acuminate. 



2. C. speciosa (A, C). 



1. Catalpa bignonioides Walt. Catalpa. Indian Bean. 

 Catalpa Catalpa Karst. 



Leaves broad-ovate, rather abruptly contracted into a slender point or sometimes 

 rounded at apex, cordate at base, entire or often laterally lobed, coated below when they 

 unfold with pale tomentum and pilose above, and at maturity thin and firm, light green 

 and glabrous on the upper surface, pale and pubescent on the lower surface, 5 '-6' long and 

 4 '-5' wide, with a prominent midrib, and primary veins arcuate near the margins, con- 

 nected by reticulate veinlets and furnished in the axils with clusters of dark hairs; turning 

 black and falling after the first severe frost in the autumn; petioles stout, terete, 5'-6' in 

 length. Flowers opening at the end of May or in June, on slender sparingly villose or 

 glabrous pedicels, in compact many-flowered panicles 8 '-10' long and broad, with light 

 green branches tinged with purple; calyx \' long, glabrous, green or light purple; corolla 

 white, nearly 2' long, \\' wide, marked on the inner surface on the low r er side by 2 rows of 

 yellow blotches following 2 parallel ridges or folds, and in the throat and on the lower lobes 



Fig. 768 



of the limb by crowded conspicuous purple spots. Fruit ripening in the autumn, in thick- 

 branched orange-colored panicles, remaining unopened during the winter, 6'-20' long and 

 i'_i' thick in the middle, with a thin wall brigkt chestnut-brown on the outer surface and 

 light olive-brown and lustrous on the inner surface, splitting in the spring into 2 flat valves; 

 seeds about 1' long, ' wide, silvery gray, with pointed wings terminating in long pencil- 

 shaped tufts of white hairs. 



A tree, rarely 60 high, with a short trunk 3-4 in diameter, long heavy brittle branches 

 forming a broad head, and dichotomous branchlets green shaded with purple when they 

 first appear, and during their first winter thickened at the nodes, slightly puberulous, lus- 

 trous, light orange color or gray-brown, covered with a slight glaucous bloom, marked by 



