California Fruits and Flowers. 1 29 



ERYTHRAEA. 



The Canchalaguas are elegant annuals, a span to a foot high, 

 producing a multitude of bright flowers. The following is the 

 largest and handsomest species in the genus. 



E. VENUSTA Gray. Flowers an inch across, rotate, with slen- 

 der tube forming a center of delicate sulphur yellow, the usually 

 five divisions of the corolla of a deep solferino, more rarely lav- 

 ender or white.* Foliage and stems of light apple green. 



ERYTHRONIUM. 



The Dog-tooth Violets are distinctively American, with the 

 exception of a single species that is a native of Europe and Asia. 

 The greatest variety of forms thrive in their nativity on the Pa- 

 cific Coast. They are beautiful lily-like fiowers, highly prized in 

 ■cultivation. They grow in shady places in rock and leaf mold 

 as a rule. The following are the names by which the principal 

 varieties are known in cultivation. 



E. CITRINUM. A variety from Oregon. 



E. GRANDIFLORUM. The leaves are broad and richly mottled 

 in brown, green and white, with delicate straw-colored flowers, 

 recurved like a lily. 



E. GRANDIFLORUM ALBIFLORUM. This sends up from long, 

 narrow corms, broad leaves, conspicuously blotched with purple, 

 and tall, slendei racemes ot two to six nodding, lily-like, long- 

 pedicelled flowers, which, when fully expanded, are nearly three 

 inches across. The segments are pale yellow, dashed with 

 orange towards the base, with darker orange spots on the inte- 

 rior face. 



E. GIGANTEUM. Flowers pure white. Considerable confu- 

 sion exists in the nomenclature of these plants, which only care- 

 ful comparisons can straighten. This, E. albiflorum and E. 

 Smithii, are all mere varieties of E. grandiflorum doubtless, and 

 probably indistinguishable from the above variety. 



E. Hendersoni. Described as the handsomest species of 

 the genus, with bright and strongly colored flowers which are 

 very striking and attractive in their beauty. The petals have a 

 very dark purple and somewhat blotched center, which is sur- 

 rounded by a band of yellow, and beyond this they are pale 

 purple. 



E. HowELLii. Light cream-colored flowers slightly tinged 

 with red, with a yellow center. Discovered in Oregon by Mr. 

 Thomas Howell, lor whom it is named. An interesting species 

 that has been found to thrive in New England in a loamy soil in 

 open sunlight. 



E. Smithii. Flowers described as pure white on opening, 

 -often changing- to purple. 



