288 NOTES ON THE GENUS YUCCA. 
Forma genuina: simplex vel parce ramosa ; foliis “oer ss oenes mucrone valido brunneo pungentibus. — Y 
aloifolia, Linn. et auct. plur. Y. Draconis? Elliott, Bot. I. 4 
Var. raconis: elatior, subsimplex ; foliis stadia ie demum reflexis mucrone debiliore pungentibus. 
— Y. pn Linn. 
Var. y. conspicua: e basi ramosa ; foliis laxioribus supra lucidis in mucronem debiliorem virescentem excurren- 
tibus. — Y. conspicua, Haw. Suppl. pl. succ. 32. 
I have seen native flowering and fruiting specimens of the genuine plant only from South Carolina, whence Dr. 
Mellichamp has abundantly supplied fresh and dried material, and from Florida ; it there grows always near the coast, 
often and apparently most luxuriantly under the direct influence of salt water ; it extends to North Carolina and to 
the eastern Gulf States ; it is also credited to the West Indies and to the eastern coast of Mexico; but on the shores of 
Lonisiana and Texas it seems to be unknown. Var. 8. is said to be a native of South Carolina ; var. y. was described 
from plants cultivated in English gardens; its native country is unknown ; my description is taken from several mag- 
nificent specimens in the botanic garden of Naples probably correctly named. 
On the coast of South Carolina Y, aloifolia grows 6-8 or very rarely 10-12 feet high, mostly simple, sometimes 
in favorable localities with a few, often three, branches ; trunk seldom more than 4 or 5, at most 6 inches in diameter, 
only the lowest part of the oldest ones covered with a rough dark brown bark ; higher up the marks of the leaf-bases 
are seen, while the upper part is coated with the withered and dependent leaves themselves, persistent for years ; the 
rigid foliage forms dense heads, the leaves, in 4} or even higher orders, are narrowest above the very broad base, and 
widest about the middle. I find them in the native specimens usually 18-24 inches long, and 1}-2 inches wide ; 
grown in the shade, they reach a length of 24-32 inches by 14 inches in width ; under the direct influence o 
salt-water on the sandy beaches of the islands near Charleston they have been found shorter and broader than [36] 
usual (18-21 by 1$-2} inches), and it was here that the three-branched plants were observed. In cultivation 
the leaves are 12-21 inches long, and 1-1} wide. Dr. Mellichamp has sometimes, in plants growing close to the beach, 
seen the upper surface of leaves incrusted with a white deposit, which might be taken for saline efflorescence, but 
proves to be carbonate of lime, with a very delicate film of organic matter representing a cast of the epidermis cells; 
probably an exudation from these cells of oxalate of lime altered by oxidation. 
The flowers open in July and August, and in the evening expand 3-4 inches, while in daytime they are 14-1? 
inches deep. I find the stamens, in native as well as in cultivated plants, as long as the ovary, often as long as the 
whole pistil and occasionally even overtopping it. The unusually stout ovary with the short stigma is 9-11 lines long, 
the ovules I found 0.35-0.38 mm. thick. The pod is 23-3 times as long as it is thick (3-4 by 14-1} inches), six-sided, 
the sides corresponding to the carpels more elevated, the alternate ones sharply depressed and turning purple before 
the rest of the fruit, which at last assumes a deep purple color inside and outside, has a sweet not unpleasant taste, 
and is much eaten under the name of Banana, It is always acutish but never rostrate, distinctly tipped with the 3- 
lobed stigma preserving its tube, whence the fruit is described as “ perforated at the apex.” The ‘seeds, 6-7 mm, in 
diameter by 24-3 in thickness, are very similar to those of all other Sarcoyuccas examined by me. 
Draconis I cannot distinguish from the last except by the leaves being said to be less crowded, longer, 
softer, less pungent, and somewhat flaccid and curved. It is said to come from the same region where my specimens, 
above described, were obtained, and may perhaps be the form with very long leaves grown in the shade, described 
above. The plants, cultivated here and there under that name, may in part he Y. Guatemalensis, described below. 
ar. conspicua, or at least the plant cultivated under that name in the botanic garden at Naples, differs from the 
type by its softer, though not pendulous, leaves, with a green scarcely pungent point. It there makes large bushes, 
over 20 feet high, branching abundantly from or near the base, the thickest trunks 6-9 inches in diameter. I 
notice that the panicles, sometimes three feet long, are almost sessile on the older trunks as they usually are in [37] 
this section ; but in vigorous young shoots they are borne on a scape of nearly their own length. When I exam- 
ined the plats they had not borne fruit for many years, though flowering abundantly ; I learn that they have been 
fertile since, but have not obtained the pods. 
There are other forms of serrulate Yuccas, most probably of mg section, described in the books or enumerated 
in the catalogues of nurserymen, which are entirely unknown to me. _Y. serrulata, crenulata, arcuata, tenuifolia, all 
named but scarcely described by Haworth (Suppl. Pl. suce.), about ‘tks does years ago, from cultivated, partly very 
young plants, and not known now. Y. aspera, Parmentieri, and albospica of the catalogues, undescribed, as I believe, 
will probably prove in part to be forms of y. aloifolia, ne the names, which cannot be identified now, the original 
having perhaps disappeared from the gardens and their native country being unknown, ought to be dropped. 
The two following, however, of which at least their flowering state and native country are known, are believed to have 
a claim to specific distinction. 
2. Yucca Yucatan, nov. spec.: elata, e basi ramosissima ; foliis lanceolato-linearibus versus basin vix angusta- 
tis carnosis brevioribus margine tenuissime asperatis demum patulis recurvisve ; panicule ovate subsessilis dense 
