SALSOLACE^;. 57 



% to % of an inch long; staminate flowers in dense globose clusters on 

 the terminal branchlets, naked or nearly so; pistillate flowers chiefly 

 below, from the leaf-axils; calyx deeply 5-cleft, occasionally unequally 

 parted and one lobe reduced; fruiting bracts orbicular, 1J 2 lines 

 broad, the margins partly free, the sides tooth-crested; seed nearly a 

 line broad. In alkaline soil near Little Oak, Solano Co. Aug. 



10. A. Californica, Moq. Branches many, slender and wiry, pros- 

 trate, from a short and thick oblong or fusiform perennial root; herbage 

 densely mealy, leaves ovate- to linear-lanceolate, 38 lines long, entire, 

 acute, the lowest opposite: flower-clusters all axillary, the upper ones 

 more staminate, the calyx of these deeply 4-cleft; fruiting bracts rhombic- 

 ovate, membranous, distinct, 1% lines long, somewhat convex: seed % 

 line broad. On the seacoast, and along the edges of salt marshes, from 

 near San Francisco and Alameda, southward. Sept. 



H- -i -i Dioecious shrubs. 



11. A. leucophylla (Moq.), Dietr. Stout, shrubby, but the stem and 

 branches flexible and mostly reclining, 1 2 ft. long; plant hoary-scurfy 

 throughout : leaves thick, broadly obovate, cuneate at base, sessile 3- 

 nerved, ^ 1^ in. long: staminate fi. in dense clusters in short terminal 

 spikes; calyx large, 5-cleft: fruiting bracts in axillary clusters 2 4 

 lines long, rhombic-ovate, united, spongy, the sides 2-crested, the nar- 

 row margin entire or obscurely toothed. On sand beaches of San Fran- 

 cisco Bay, and along the seacoast southward. Oct. 



4. SALICORNIA, Tourn. (SAMPHIRE). Herbs or shrubs with cylin- 

 drical fleshy jointed and apparently leafless branches. Flowers very 

 simple, in threes at the joints of the spike-like ends of the branches; the 

 lateral ones of each trio often only staminate. Perianth of 4 or 5 dis- 

 tinct or variously united sepals, at length spongy-thicked about the 

 fruit. Stamens 1 or 2. Styles 2 or 3, short. Pericarp membranaceous, 

 adherent to, or free from the vertical seed. 



* Branches and flowers opposite. 



1. S. ambigna, Michx. Perennial, decumbent, often rooting at the 

 base, usually freely branching, %l% ft. high: spikes not thicker than 

 the sterile parts of the branches, % 2 in. long: perianth sac-like, with 

 an anterior opening (formed of 2 sepals united above and below), enclos- 

 ing the fruit: pericarp membranous, adherent to the obovate-oblong 

 seed, this % line long, pubescent. Plentiful in salt marshes. 



* * Branches alternate and flowers spirally arranged in the spikes. 



2. S. occidentalis (Wats), Greene. Shrubby, diffusely branched, the 

 main stem erect, often 5 ft. high, with a close and smooth gray bark: 



