Vaccinium. ERICACEJE. 25 



sistent : flowers in short racemes or clusters from separate buds : bracteate and 

 2-bracteolate. 



* Flowers 5-mei-ous, lO-androus. 



V. OVatum. Pursh. Erect evergreen shrub, 3 to 5 feet high, rigid : branchlets pubes- 

 cent : leaves thick and firm, very numerous, from oblong-ovate to oblong-lanceolate, acute 

 mmutely and acutely serrate, glabrous or nearly so, bright green both sides, an inch or so' 

 long; the vems obscure or hidden: flowers in short and close axillary clusters : bracts and 

 bractlets deciduous : corolla campanulate, 2 lines long, rose-color or flesh-color, barely 

 tlirice the length of the triangular acute reddish calyx-lobes : berries reddish turning 

 black small, sweetish. - Fl. i. 290 ; Lindl. Bot. Reg. t. 1354. V. lanceolatum, Dunal in DC 

 1. c. o70, a narrow-leaved form. Metagonia (Pyxothammis) ovata, Nutt. 1. c — Vancouver's 

 Island to Montevey, &c., California, on hills near the coast. 



V. crassif Olium, Andr. Procumbent, the trailing slender stems 2 or 3 feet long 

 glabrous or nearly so : leaves small, a quarter to half inch long, from oval to narrowly 

 oblong, sparsely mucronate-serrulate or entire, shining: flowers few and almost sessile in 

 small axillary clusters : bracts scaly-coriaceous, persistent : corolla globose-campanulate 

 nearly white : anther-cells barely pointed at apex : berries black. — Bot. Rep. t 105 • Bot 

 Mag. t 1 152 ; Chapra. Fl. 259. V. carnosum, Pers. Syn. i. 479. V. myrtifoUum, Michx! Fl. i. 

 T? ;• ^^fT""" "'^'■^'>^*«' Nutt. 1. c. - Sandy bogs, N. Carolina to Georgia, near the coast. 

 Habit of Cranberry. 



* * Flowers 4-merous, 8-androus. 



V. Vitis-Id*a, L. (Cowberry, Mountain Cranberry.) Almost glabrous, tufted, 3 

 inches to a span or more high from creeping stems : leaves crowded, obovate or oval 

 emarginate (a quarter to over half inch long), shining above, paler and bristly dark-dotted 

 beneath ; the margins revolute, entire or obscurely serrulate : flowers crowded in a short 

 and termmal secund and nodding raceme: bracts reddish, nearly persistent: corolla white 

 or rose-color, open-campanulate, rather deeply 4-lobed : berries dark red, acid and bitterish, 

 edible when cooked (a fair substitute for cranberries). — Fl. Dan. t. 40; Lodd. Bot. Cab! 

 t. 616. V. jmnctahun. Lam. — Round the Arctic circle, south to the coast and mountains of 

 N. New-England, and Lake Winipeg; on the western coast south to Britisli Columbia. 

 (Greenland to Japan.) 



§ 5. OxTcoccus. (Oxycoccus, Pers.) Corolla deeply 4-cleft or 4-parted; the 

 lobes linear or lanceolate-oblong and reflexed : anthers exserted, awnless, with 

 very long terminal tubes : ovary and berry 4-celled, destitute of false partitions : 

 flowers axillary and terminal, nodding on long filiform pedicels, appearing in early 

 summer ; fruit maturing in autumn. 



* Erect shrubs, with deciduous membranaceous leaves and berries of ^Mmccinmm, but corolla of 

 irxx^Oxy coccus: flowers solitary ni the axils : pedicel bractless but minutely 2-bracteolate at base: 

 corolla conical-rostrate in the bud, deeply 4-cleft : filaments villous. ( V. Japonicum of Miquel is 

 a very nearly related Japanese species. ) — Vaccinium § Oxycoccoides, Benth. '& Hook. ' 



V. erythrocarpon, Michx. Divergently branching shrub, 1 to 4 feet high, slightly 

 pubescent : leaves oblong-lanceolate or ovate-oblong, acuminate, finely serrate with bristle- 

 tipped teeth, thin, bright green both sides, veiny, acute or merely obtuse at base (H to 

 3 inches long) : pedicel about half the length of the leaf: corolla flesh-color (about half 

 inch long) : berry light red, turning nearly black at full maturity, watery, slightly acid. — 

 Fl. i. 227. Oxycoccus erectus, Pursh, Fl. i. 264. 0. erythrocarpus, Ell. Sk. i. 447. — Damp 

 woods in the higher Alleghanies, Virginia to Georgia. • 



* * (CRANnERRY.) Trailing and creeping lignescent plants, with filiform stems, and small per- 



sistent leaves with entire revolute margins and the lower face whitened: filiform pedicels 1 to 4 

 from a terminal scaly bud, erect, and bearing a flesh-colored or pale rose-colored flower nod- 

 ding from Its apex : corolla conical-cylindraceous in the bud, deeply 4-parted: filaments puberu- 

 lent: berry red and acid. — Oxycoccus (Pers.), Benth. & Hook. 



V. Oxycoccus, L. (Small Cranberry.) Stems very slender, creeping: leaves ovate, 

 acute, 2 to 4 lines long ; the margins much revolute : pedicels 1 to 4 in a fascicle from a 

 terminal and not proliferous thin-scaly bud : filaments commonly fully half the length of 

 the anthers : berry globose, a quarter to a third of an inch in diameter, often spotted when 



