194 BOTANY. 
to the European G. ciliata, also a perennial species, which used to be claimed 
as an annual; barbellata, however, has seeds similar to those of serrata, though 
much smaller, while ciliata has the winged seeds of simplex, and has an indefi- 
nite number of leaves. I have since had the opportunity of studying barbel- 
lata in the mountains of Colorado, and found that it possesses a creeping, 
filiform rhizoma, 2—3 inches below the surface, from which at intervals filiform 
stems arise. These bear, at their thickened upper end, where they reach 
the surface of the soil, an undeveloped terminal bud of indefinite growth, 
and lateral annual flowering stems, the scars of which, enveloped by 
withered leaf-bases, can be traced sometimes for five or six years back. 
Each 
season the terminal bud developes two pairs of basal leaves; from the axil 
The vegetation of the plant is accomplished in the following manner. 
of one of the outer leaves, the single flowering branch originates. Inside of 
the two leaf-pairs just mentioned, we find a third and a fourth pair unde- 
veloped, about half an inch long, which are to grow into the basal leaves in 
the following season; and within these the four leaves of the next succeeding 
season, now only half a line long, are already preformed. The flowering 
branch, usually 3 or 4 inches high, normally bears one pair of leaves in 
the middle, and a second involucral pair just below the almost sessile 
flower; the four sepals are opposite these four leaves, and the four corolla- 
lobes alternate with the sepals, and so on. In the axil of one of the third 
pair of basal leaves preparing for next year, usually alternating with, or 
sometimes opposite to, the present flowering branch, the bud of next year’s 
flowering apparatus is already four lines long; it shows plainly the two 
pairs of leaves and the calyx, and, in a very rudimentary state, also the 
corolla. Thus each year’s vegetation exhibits at the flowering period 
(August and September), on the primary axis, two pairs of leaves for the 
present, two pairs for the next, and two for the third year, a secondary 
axis with two leaf-pairs and the flower, and another preformed secondary 
axis with the rudiments of the same organs for the next year. No other 
Gentian has, as far as I know, such a typical growth, with the regular 
preformation of all the organs, but we find the same among other plants in 
other families, a striking example of, which is furnished by our Nelwmbium. 
The regularity in our Gentian is not as absolute asin Nelwmbium; for ocea- 
