AUernanthera. CIIENOPODIACE.E. 43 



2. NITROPHILA, Watson. 



Flowers perfect, mostly 2-bracted. Perianth of 5 (rarely 6 or 7) equal erect con- 

 cave and carinate sepals. Stamens as many, united at base into a very narrow peri- 

 gynous disk : anthers 2 -celled : staminodia none. Style short : stigmas 2, slender. 

 Utricle subglobose, indehiscent, 1 -seeded, beaked by the persistent style, included 

 within the connivent sepals. — A low perennial branching glabrous herb, with 

 fleshy opposite araplexicaul leaves, and axillary sessile or shortly pedicellate llowers. 

 Bot. King Exp. 297. Bamlia § Idiopsis, Moquin, DC. Prodr. xiii'-^. 279. 



1. N. occidentalis, Watson, 1. c Stems ascending or decumbent, 3 to 8 inches 

 high, frum a pcieuuial running rootstock, branching from the base and angular : 

 lowermost leaves broadly ovate or oblong, 2 or 3 lines long ; the rest linear, G to 1 2 

 lines long, semiterete, acuminate and cuspidate : bracts similar but shorter, mostly 

 twice longer than the flowers : flowers 1 to 3 in each axil ; the lateral ones frequently 

 short-pedicelled, 2 - 3-bracted, the central one often bractless : sepals a line long, 

 rather rigid, ovate, acutish, exceeding the stamens and style : utricle brownish : seed 

 half a line broad, black and shining. — Banalia occidentalis, Moquin, 1. c. 



In moist ground near alkaline springs; Oregon {Nutlall) ; Lower Sacramento {Pickering); 

 Providence Mountains {Cooper) ; Western Nevada, Stretch, JFatson. 



3. CLADOTHRIX, Nutt. 



Flowers perfect, 3-bracted ; bracts concave, hyaline. Perianth of 5 erect etpial 

 oblong rigid-scarious sepals, somewhat pilose with verticillately branched hairs. 

 Stamens 5, the filaments united at base into a short cup : anthers large, oblon-.-, 

 1 -celled. Ovary subglobose : style short ; stigma capitate, 2-lobed. Utricle ovate- 

 globose, indehiscent, 1-seeded. — Low annual, or erect and woody at base, densely 

 stellate-tomentose, with opposite small rounded entire petiolate leaves, and very 

 small flowers solitary or few in the axils. — Benth. &, Hook. Gen. PI. iii. 37. 



Only the two following species are known. 



1. C. lanuginosa, Nutt. in herb. Annual, prostrate or ascending, diffusely 

 branched, densely white-tomentose becoming glabrate ; stems often a foot or two 

 long: leaves round-obovate to rhomboidal, more or less attenuate at base, 3 to 10 

 lines long, often in threes, two of them smaller : flowers mostly in pairs ; sepals k>ss 

 than a line long, obtusish, twice longer than the broader hairy-tipi.ed bracts : utnclc 

 glabrous, shorter than the se.iMh. ^ Achi/ranthes lanuginosa, Nutt. Fl. Ark. 16(J. 

 AUernanthera (1) lanuginosa, Torr. in Emory's Rep. 150, and Bot. Mex. Bound. 180 ; 

 Moquin, JJC. Prodr. xiii^. 359. 



Banks of the Colorado near Chimney Peak {Newberry), and eastward to Arkansas and Texas. 



C. suFFr.UTicosA, Benth. & Hook. Somewhat woody at base, erect and much hranclied half 

 a toot hicrh or less : leaves rounded or ovate, truncate or usually rounded at base, 2 to b hues long, 

 ^ cry shortly yi^WoV^^X. ^ ALtcrna'>Uhera{:()saffriaicom, Torr. iu Bot. Mex. Bound. 181. Valley 

 (.1 the Kio Grande, Wriyht. 



Order LXXIX. CHENOPODIACE^. 



Herbs or shrui)s, often succulent or scurfy, sometimes fleshy and leafless, usually 

 with simple and alternate leaves, without stipules ; the small and sessile commonly 

 clustered flowers either naked or with herbaceous (not scarious) bracts, a i)i-riantli 

 of 5 or fewer usually herbaceous and persistent sepals, often changed in fruit 



