Balsamorhiza. COMrOSIT^. 347 



43. RUDBECKIA, Linn. Coxe-flower. 



Head many-flowered, lieterogamous, with neutral ray-flowers, rarely homogamous 

 by the absence of these ; disk-flovvers perfect. Involucre of foliaceous commonly 

 unequal scales in one or two series, mostly spreading. Eeceptacle remarkably ele- 

 vated, in ours columnar, at least at maturity, so that the perfect flowers are spicate ; 

 each flower subtended or partly embraced by a chaff. Eays long and nearly entire. 

 Disk-corollas cylindraceous, 5-tootlied. Akenes quadrangular and mostly laterally 

 compressed, smooth, crowned (in our species) with a persistent chaff-like cup or 4 

 chaffy teeth more or less united into a cup. — Chiefly perennial herbs, with alternate 

 leaves, disk-flowers from dark brown to greenishyellow, and mostly yellow rays ; 

 all North American, but only two west of the Eocky Mountains. 



1. R. Californica, Gray. Stem simple, about 3 feet high, 3-5-leaved, the 

 long and naked peduncle-like summit bearing a single large head : leaves finely 

 softq>ubescent, 3 to 5 inches long, varying from ovate to oblong-lanceolate, acumi- 

 nate, pinnately veined, somewhat toothed ; the middle ones sometimes with a pair 

 of lateral lanceolate lobes at base ; uppermost sessile ; lower tapering into a slender 

 petiole : scales of the involucre linear : rays 2 or 3 inches long, narrowly oblong, 

 yellow : disk columnar, one or two inches long, dusky brownish : akenes com- 

 pressed-prismatic, 2 lines long, crowned with a pappus of 4 irregular tliickish chafl'y 

 teeth more or less united at base into a cup.— Proc. Am. Acad. vii. 357. 



Wet grassy places in the Sierra Nevada : at tlie Mariposa grove, Bulandcr. Previously col- 

 lected by Bridges, pertiaps in the same district. 



E. occiDENTALis, Nutt., of Oregon and Utah, differs in its smooth and more numerous as weff 

 as broader feaves, and has no rays at ail. 



44. BALSAMOEHIZA, Hook., Nutt. Balsam-uoot. 



Head many-flowered, heterogamous, with fertile ray-flowers, and perfect disk- 

 flowers. Involucre hemispherical or broader, of more or less imbricated scales, the 

 outer loose and herbaceous or often foliaceous. Eeceptacle flat or barely convex, 

 with linear-lanceolate chaff (often with herbaceous tips), subtending and partly 

 embracing the disk-flowers. Eays oblong or lanceolate, with short tube (deciduous 

 except in one species) : disk-corollas cylindrical. Branches of the style of perfect 

 flowers slender, hispid throughout or on the long filiform appendages. Akenes of 

 the ray obcompressed (i. e. flattened parallel with the scales) and oblong, of the disk 

 prismatic-quadrangular or more or less compressed. Pappus none. — Low peren- 

 nials of Western North America, mostly of the arid plains; with thick terebinthine . 

 roots, chiefly radical leaves, and scape-like stems ; the few cauline leaves alternate 

 or occasionally opposite, and the rather large head of yellow flowers commonly soli- 

 tary. (Named from the resin or balsam of the root.) 



The thick roots, or tubers, from which sometimes the turpentine-tasted resinous bark is peeled, 

 are cooked for food by the Indians, especiaffy in Oregon, under the names of Pash, Kuyoum, Kc. 

 The seeds are afso eaten. — Besides the species here described, 



B (liALLiACTis) Carey ANA, Gray, of the interior of Oregon, forms a peculiar subgenus, Imviiig 

 rays' which become paperv, like those of a Zbmia, and persist on the fruit ; the akem^ are omen- 

 ous-pubescent and afl .lu^drangular, those of the ray fess flattened Cobcompressed) than i^ com- 

 mon in the genus. The stem, moreover, bears several heads. _ 



B. MACROPHYLLA, Nutt., of tlie Rocky Mountain region only, is a genuine ff^e^' "^-"^^tj^ 

 variable 5. HookcH, and fike it with leaves both un.hvided and pinnately P^jf '[ «" tX^^;'"i^ 

 root ; but these or their divisions are entire, almost gfabrous and smooth, and the involuci-e is 

 generally fofiaceous. 



