240 COMPOSITE. (composite family.) 



serrate, veiny; disk-flowers 16-24, the rays 12-16. — Rocky and wooded 

 hills, Maine and W. Vermont to Pennsylvania, and the mountains of Virginia : 

 rather rare. 



§2. VIRGAtlREA, Tourn. Scales of the involucre destitute of herbaceous tips : 



rays mostly fewer than the disk-floivers : heads all more or less pedicelled. 



* Heads clustered in the axils of the feather-veined leaves. 



2. S. bicolor, L. Hoary or grayish with soft hairs; stem mostly simple; 

 leaves oblong or elliptical-lanceolate, acute at both ends, or the lower oval and 

 tapering into a petiole, slightly serrate ; clusters or short racemes from the axils of 

 the upper leaves, forming an interrupted spike or crowded panicle; rays small, 

 cream-color or nearly ichite. — Vav. concolor has the rays yellow. — Dry copses 

 and banks : the var. in Pennsylvania and westward. 



3. S. latifOlia, L. Smooth or nearly so, stem angled, zigzag, simple or 

 paniculate-branched (l°-3° high) ; leaves broadly ovate or oval, very strongly and 

 sharply serrate, conspicuously pointed at both ends (thin, 3' -6' long) ; heads in very 

 short axillary clusters, or somewhat prolonged at the end of the branches. — 

 Moist shaded banks : common northward, and along the mountains. 



4. S. C86Sia, L. Smooth; stem terete, mostly glaucous, at length much 

 branched and diffuse; leaves lanceolate or oblong-lanceolate, serrate, pointed, 

 sessile; heads in very short clusters, or somewhat racemose-panicled on the 

 branches. — Moist rich woodlands : common. 



* * Racemes terminal, erect, either somewhat simple and wand-like, or compound and 



panicled, not one-sided: leaves feather-veined. (Not maritime.) 



•*- Heads small : leaves nearly entire, except the lowermost. 



5. S. virgata, Michx. Very smooth throughout ; stem strict and simple, wand- 

 like (2° -4° high), slender, beset with small and entire appressed lanceolate-ob- 

 long thickish leaves, which are gradually reduced upwards to mere bracts ; the 

 lowest oblong-spatulate ; heads crowded in a very narrow compound spicate raceme; 

 rays 5-7. — Damp pine barrens, New Jersey and southward. 



6. S. puberula, Nutt. Stem (l°-3° high, simple or branched) and pan- 

 icle minutely hoary ; stem-leaves lanceolate, acute, tapering to the base, smoothish ; the 

 lower wedge-lanceolate and sparingly toothed; heads very numerous and crowded 

 in compact short racemes forming a prolonged and dense narrow or pyramidal panicle ; 

 scales of die involucre linear-awl -shaped, appressed; rays about 10. — Sandy soil, 

 Maine to Virginia and southward, near the coast. 



7. S. Stricta, Ait. Very smooth throughout; stem simple, strict (2° -3° 

 high) ; leaves lanceolate, pointed, the lower tapering into winged petioles, partly 

 sheathing at the base, minutely serrate above with appressed teeth ; racemes much 

 crowded and appressed in a dense wand-like panicle ; scales of the involucre linear- 

 oblong, obtuse ; rays 5-6, small. — Peat-bogs, Maine to Pennsylvania, Wis- 

 consin, and northward, Root-leaves 6' -10' long. Flowers earlier than most 

 species, beginning in July. 



-t- «- Ihads rather large, at least for the size of the plant. 



8. S. spcci6sa, Nutt. Stem stout (3° -6° high), smooth; leaves thickish, 

 VM/A smooth with rough margins, oral or orate, slightly serrate, the uppermost oblong- 



U. . lanceolate, the lower contracted into a margined petiole ; heads somewhat 



