42 LINAGES. (flax FAMILY.) 



spikes or racemes of shoiuy pink-red flowers. — Common on the plains from 

 Colorado to British America, and eastward to Iowa and Mimiesota. 



2. M. Munroanum, Gray. Taller, graijish or howy-puhescent : haves 

 broadly ovute, usually cordate at base, 3 to 5-lobed or deeply cleft : Jlowers scar- 

 let. — Utah, Montana, and westward. 



4. SPHiERALCEA, St. Hilaire. 



Differing from Malvastrnm only in the two-ovuled cells of the ovary. 



1. S. aQgUStifolia, Spach. Slender, erect, hoary -pubescent : leaves obhng to 

 narrowly lanceolate, usually subcordate or rounded at base, crenate or coarsely 

 toothed: flowers small. — S. Colorado and southward. 



2. S. rivularis, rorr. Taller, scabrous with a stellate pubescence : leaves 

 cordate, deeply 5 to 1-lobed, coarsely serrate : racemes leafy below, naked 

 above ; the flowers clustered on short peduncles, light purple or nearly white 

 — S. acerifoUa of the Hayden Reports for 1870-72 and Bot. King's Exp. 

 W. Wyoming, northward and westward. 



6. ABUTILON, Tourn. Indian Mallow. 



Herbs, usually soft-tomentose : flowers mostly axillary, yellow (in ours). 



1. A. parvullim, Gray. Cinereous-tomentose : stems slender, spread- 

 ing, paniculate above ; branchlets pilose with spreading hairs : leaves small, 

 cordate, dentate, sometimes 3-lobed, canescent, tomentose beneath : peduncles 

 axillary, 1-flowered, longer than the leaf. — Ledges of rock near Canon City, 

 Colorado {Greene), and southward. 



Order 16. L.I1VACEJE. (Flax Family.) 



Herbs, with the regular and symmetrical hypogynous flowers 4 to 6- 

 (5 in ours) merous throughout, strongly imbricated calyx and convolute 

 petals, the stamens monadelphous at the base, and the pod 8 to 10-seeded, 

 having twice as many cells as there are styles. 



1. LINUM, L. Flax. 



Styles often united into one below ; ovary globose. Seeds flattened, ovate, 

 the coat mucilaginous when wetted. — Herbs (sometimes shrubby at base) 

 with tough fibres in the bark, sessile entire alternate leaves, no stipules, and 

 cymose or panicled flowers. 



* Petals blue. 



1. Ii. perenne, L. Branching above, leafy: leaA'es linear to linear- 

 fanceolate, acute : flowers large, in few-flowered corymbs or scattered on the 

 leafy branches : capsule exceeding the sepals, the prominent false partitions 

 long-ciliate. — Common on dry soils throughout our whole range, thence 

 northward and westward. 



* * Petals yellow : sepals glandular-margined. 



2. L. rigidum, Pursh. Stems angled, much branched: leaves linear, 

 pungenlly-acute, rigid, with scabrous margins : pedicels thickened at the end and 



