ASTER MACROPHYLLUS PINGUIFOLIUS 325 
Stem brittle, pale green or brownish, leafy. Leaf-form cordate- 
overlapping. Largest leaves seen (Niagara gorge) reach 12 x 8 
in., subentire, with a very fleshy dark-green petiole of 9 in. More 
frequent size 6 x 5 in. Radicals often 4, the rst small, reniform- 
cordate, 217 x 21% or less, the rest nearly of one pattern, the 
sinus increasingly close 
exture that of undressed kid, with some portions unctuous 
and others finely granular. Sometimes all leaves of a plantation 
are unctuous and smooth ; sometimes on the largest plants only ; 
sometimes true of the surface on one side of a midrib while the 
other side is already roughish in life. Smooth and even greasy 
leaves often roughen in drying, especially if under but light pres- 
sure. Sometimes some plants of a smooth patch not different in 
other ways will be rough all over in life; but usually such plants 
are smaller-leaved. These differences in this variety seem inde- 
pendent of shade. 
Inflorescence broad, rather level and wide-angled when full- 
grown. Heads subsessile when young, some often still subsessile 
when most pedicels have attained an inch length. Heads rather 
larger; if numerous they are widely separated. 
Rays pale lavender, quickly becoming very pale, and soon 
whitish ; perhaps in cultivation sometimes full white from the first, 
but usually at least a tinge of lavender shows at the base of the 
young ray while erect and involute before expansion. 
Cultivation perhaps increases the leaf-breadth and size when in 
rich soil, and develops the unctuous tendency ; the native plants 
which show these characters grow in richer soil than neighboring 
harsh A. macrophyllus plants. On extending into less favorable 
more open and more hard-baked soil, native plants become more 
condensed in inflorescence and develop only moderate leaves which 
are firm hard and minutely granular-roughened on drying; the 
heads forming subsessile clumps, widely bracteate by close sub- 
tending axiles: the rays pale lavender in bud, white on flattening. 
These bracteate plants (observed in one grassy woodroad for five 
years) owe their chief difference from the type to the suppression 
of pedicels, though that produces a great disguise; but some of 
them on obtaining more shade in later years proved to develop the 
typical characters. 
—Development. Well-developed radical leaves May 13 (99), 
all very smooth or even unctuous; some petioles show slight 
