A note on Penstemon Stephensi 
T. S. BRANDEGEE 
The reduction of Penstemon Stephensi Brandegee to a variety 
of P. Clevelandi Gray has recently been made*, with the mention 
of a few points of difference and the neglect of an important 
character, the color of the flowers. P. Stephensi is a purple- 
flowered and P. Clevelandi a_ scarlet-flowered penstemon. 
Having seen both species alive and growing, I am certain that 
they have very differently colored flowers and that P. Stephensa 
with its light purple corolla can not represent a color-form of 
the scarlet P. Clevelandi. When a scarlet-flowered species as- 
sumes a color-form the flowers become yellow. Some fine 
specimens of the scarlet-flowered P. centhranthifolius Benth., 
with yellow flowers, grow along the road between Coalinga and 
Paso Robles, California. 
*See Munz & Johnston, Bull. Torrey Club 49: 41. 1922. 
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