Botanical Excursion to the Mountains of North Carolina. 23 



chaux discovered it on his earliest visit to the monntains, and 

 where Mr. Curtis has recently observed it,) to the western rano-es 

 of the Alleghanies of Pennsylvania in lat. 40°, where it was 

 found by the younger Michaux.* It flowers early in the season, 

 and the oleaginous fruit in the specimens we collected had at- 

 tained the size of a musket ball. 



In wet places, on the very borders of North Carolina, but still 

 within Virginia, we first met with Trautvetteria palmaia and 

 Diphylleia cymosa ; the former in full flower, the latter in fruit. 

 Trautvetteria, which I doubt not is more nearly allied to Thalic- 

 trum than to Cimicifuga or Actaea, was collected by Pursh in Vir- 

 ginia, both on the Salt-Pond Mountain and the Peaks of Otter. 

 The Diphylleia is confined to springy places, and the margin of 

 shaded mountain brooks, in the rich and deep alluvial soil which 

 is so general throughout these mountains, never occurring, per- 

 haps, at a lower elevation than three thousand feet above the 

 level of the sea. It is a more striking plant than we had sup- 

 posed ; the cauhne leaves (generally two, but sometimes three in 

 number,) being often two feet in diameter, and the radical, which 

 are orbicular and centrally peltate as in Podophyllum^ frequently 

 still larger; so that it is not easy (at this season) to obtain man- 

 ageable specimens. The branches of the cyme are usually red- 

 dish or purple, and the gibbous, deep blue and glaucous berries 

 are almost dry when ripe. The latter often contain as many as 

 four perfect seeds ; and it is proper to remark that the embryo is 

 not 'very minute,' as described in the Flora of Noi^th America; 

 but, in the ripe seeds recently examined, is one-third the length 

 of the albumen, as stated by Decaisne, or even longer. The co- 

 tyledons are elliptical, flattish, and nearly the length of the thick, 

 slightly club-shaped radicle. The whole embryo is also some- 

 what flattened ; so that when the seed is longitudinally divided 

 in one direction, the embryo, examined in place, appears to be 

 very slender, and to agree with DeCandolle's description. The 

 albumen is horny when dry, and has a bitter taste. Along the 

 road-side, we shortly afterwards collected the equivocal Vaccinium 

 erythrocarpum of Michaux, or Oxy coccus erectus of Pursh ; a low, 

 erect, dichotomously branched shrub, with the habit, foliage, and 

 fruit of Vaccinium, but the flowers of Oxycoccus. It here oc- 



* Travels to the Westward of the Alleghany Mountains, <^-c., Engl. Ed. p. 57, etc. 



