PLANTS COLLECTED BY DR. GAMBEL. 185 
*PHORADENDRON.+ ; 
P. CALIFoRNICUM. Leafless ; stem and elongated branches terete ; sheathing scales bifid, segments ovate 
acute ; berries round and few, opposite, sessile in marginal cup-shaped receptacles. 
Branches a foot or more in length, sometimes dichotomous hy abortion, but with the 
branches or branchlets usually opposite. Male spikes very short, as well as those of 
the female; the scales a little pubescent and acute, nearly two-parted on the stem. 
The first pair of scales on the male spike, subtends six flowers, or two on a side. 
Berries white ? and small, sessile in cup-shaped depressions of the rachias, the summit 
of the berry marked with the small three-cleft divisions of the acute calyx. Petals 
none. 
Has. In the mountains of Upper California. Parasitic on the trunks and 
branches of a Strombocarpus. 
This plant agrees exactly in its character with Viscum flavescens, and these, with 
several other American species, ought to constitute a genus distinct from the 
V. album of Europe; distinguished by the ordinary distinct two-celled anthers of 
the male flowers, which are globular, mostly trifid, rarely bifid or quadrifid, the 
anther opens by two large terminal pores or foramina, and without filament, is 
attached to the sides of the three-sided torus at the base of the calyx, the anther only 
being free. In the feniale there is no vestige of corolla, a persistent calyx of three, rarely 
four minute triangular clefts, adhering to the summit of the globular or ovate berry ; 
the style is extremely short, almost sessile in the centre of a triangular fleshy disk, 
_ which also as well as the style exists in the male flower. These plants appear to be 
wholly American, extending from the State of Delaware to the tropics, and to a very 
- considerable distance through the southern hemisphere ; branches usually opposite or 
verticillate, rarely aphyllous. 
To this genus I would refer the present plant P. californicum, the Viscum flavescens, 
V. villosum, V. trinervium, V. buxifolium, V. saururoides, V. tereticaule, V. 
martinicense, V. crassifolium, V. leptostachyum, V. perottetii, V. brachystachyum, 
V. rubrum, V. berterianum, V. schottii,. V. macrostachyon, V. piperoides, V. 
angustifolium, V. affine, V. ensifolium, V. velutinum, V. interruptum, these and most © 
of the other American species will probably arrange with the preceding in this 
genus. The V. stellatum of Nepal, which I have examined, appears to be a true 
congener with the V. album, as well as V. orientale, though in the latter I have found 
but two adnate anthers, to four petals. A true Viscum also appears to exist in China 
near Canton. 
t From 9a; a thief, and éedp:9 @ tree; in allusion to their parasitic habit. 
