CARYOPHYLLACE^E. (pink family.) 91 



seeded. — Low, usually tufted herbs, with sessile exstipulate leaves and small 

 white flowers. (Name from arena, sand, in which many of the species grow.) 

 — The following sections are by many botanists taken tor genera, as they were 

 in the former edition. 



§ 1 . A'REN ARIA proper. Pod splitting ivholly or part-way down into 3 or at 

 length into 6 valves: seeds many, naked at the hilum. 



1. A. serpyllifolia, L. (Thyme-leaved Sandwort.) Diffusely 

 branched, roughish (2' -6' high); leaves ovate, acute, small; cymes leafy; 

 sepals lanceolate, pointed, 3 - 5-nervcd, about as long as the petals and the 6- 

 toothed pod. — A low annual, in sandy waste places. June -Aug. (Nat. 

 from Eu.) 



§ 2. ALSINE, (Tourn.) Wahl. Pod splitting to the base into 3 entire valves: 

 seeds many, usually rough, naked at the hilum : flowers solitary and terminal or 

 cymose : root in our species perennial. 



* Leaves small, rigid, awl-shaped or bristle-shaped. 



2. A. squarrbsa, Michx. (Pine-barren S.) Densely tufted from a \fo\ U. 

 deep perpendicular root; leaves closely imbricated, but spreading, awl-shaped, 



short, chanuelleil ; branches naked and minutely glandular above, several-flow- 

 ered; sepals obtuse, ovate, shorter than the pod. (Alsine, ed. 2.) — In pure 

 sand, S. New York, New Jersey, and southward along the coast. May - July. 



3. A. Stricta, Michx. Erect, or usually diffusely spreading from a small JU- aJL », 

 root, smooth ; leaves slender, between aivl-shaped and bristle-form, with many others 



clustered in the axils ; cyme diffuse, naked, many-flowered ; sepals pointed, 3- 

 ribbed, ovate, as long as the pod. (Alsine Michauxii, Fenzl.) — Rocks and dry 

 wooded banks, Vermont to Wisconsin and Kentucky. July. — The specific 

 name is a bad one, as there is nothing strict about the plant. 



* * Leaves soft and herbaceous, filiform-linear : petals refuse or notched. 



4. A. patula, Michx. Diffusely branched from the slender root ; stems 

 filiform (G'-10' long) ; branches of the cyme diverging; peduncles long; sepals 

 lanceolate, acuminate, 3-5-nerved. (Alsine, ed. 2.) — Cliffs of Kentucky River, 

 mountains of Western Virginia, and southward. 



5. A. Groenlandica, Spreng. (Mountain S.) Densely tufted from 

 slender roots, smooth; flowering stems filiform, erect (2' -4' high), few-flow- 

 ered; sepals oblong, obtuse, nerveless. "(Stellaria Grcenlandica, Retz. Alsine, ed. 

 2.) — Summit of the Shawangunk, Catskill, and Adirondack Mountains, New 

 York, of all the higher mountains of New England, and northward ; alpine or 

 subalpine. At Bath, Maine, on river-banks near the sea. June - Aug. — 

 Leaves and peduncles 3" -6" long; flowers large in proportion. 



A. giAisa, Michx., of the mountain-tops in Carolina, may occur on those of 

 Virginia, and is perhaps a large form of the above. 



§ 3. MGEHRiNGIA, L. Parts of the flower sometimes in fours: pod as in § 1, 

 but the young ovary 3-celled : seeds rather few, smooth and ivith a thickish ap- 

 pendage (strophiole) at the hilum: perennials, with flaccid broadish leaves. 



6. A. laterifldra, L. Sparingly branched, erect, minutely pubescent; 

 leaves oval or oblong obtuse (£'- 1' long) ; peduncles 2- (rarely 3 -4-) flowered, 



