12 ADDISONIA 
but branches freely above the middle, and each branch terminates 
in a cluster of flower-heads. The stems and branches are normally 
quite smooth and rather closely beset with long, narrow, bright- 
green leaves, three to eight inches long by less than an inch wide. 
Each leaf tapers gradually at base and apex, is smooth or nearly 
so on both surfaces, and is either entire at the margin or wit 
small sharp scattered teeth. The flower-heads at the end of the 
stem and branches are grouped i into a loose, irregular, rounded or 
flattened cluster, which varies from a few inches to over a foot in 
width and contains as many as a hundred heads. Some of the 
heads are almost hidden among the leaves; others are on stout 
stalks one to three inches long. The central head blooms first and 
is followed by the central heads at the end of the branches and later 
y the marginal ones, so that the period of bloom lasts for many 
days. Each flower-head is enclosed while in bud by an involucre, or 
cluster of specialized leaves known individually as involucral 
scales. ese are very slender, spreading and curved, and as 
much as an inch long. As the head comes into bloom, these 
scales spread somewhat and from the center of the involucre RDECee 
the Se Be red-purple florets. ‘There are from fifty to nearly a 
d 
hun f these in each head, and, as in most members of this family 
of plants, the conspicuousness of the flower-heads depends more 
upon the n he florets than upon the e s 
fruit ripens, the involucre spreads widely, finally exposing the 
cluster of slender seedlike fruits, one from each floret, Sats a fourth 
an inch long and surmounted by a tuft of dull-purple hairs, or 
pappiss by which the seeds are coaitered through the agency of 
H. A. GLEASON. 
EXPLANATION OF PiatE. Fig. 1—Flowering stem. Fig. 2——Flower, X2. 
