42 CRTJCIFER^E. Smelowskia. 



16. SMELOWSKIA, C. A. Meyer. 



Pod short, pointed at each end, 4-angled, few-seeded : valves strongly 1-nerved 



and carinate. Seeds in one row, ohlong, not margined ; cotyledons incumbent. 



Petals white or pinkish : anthers oval to oblong. — Dwarf alpine perennials ; leaves 



narrowly pinnatifid. 



A genus of 4 or 5 species, all Siberian, and one of them also found in the mountains of Western 

 America. A doubtful Californian species is added. 



1. S. calycina, C. A. Meyer. Densely white-tomentose to nearly glabrous, cespi- 

 tose, the much-branched rootstock thickly covered with the sheathing bases of dead 

 leaves : stems erect, simple, 2 to 6 inches high : leaves mostly radical and with 

 long slender petioles, pinnate or pinnatifid ; segments linear to oblong, entire or 

 sparingly lobed : calyx villous : petals 2 lines long : pods 3 to 6 lines long, a line 

 wide, attenuate to each end and beaked with the short style and broad stigma, 

 ascending on spreading pedicels : seeds 2 to 8, a line long. — Hidchinsia calycina, 

 Desv. ; Hook. Fl. i. 58, t. 17, fig. B; Watson, Bot. King Exp. 24. 



On Lassen's Peak and in the northern Sierra Nevada (Lcmmon) : from Colorado to Oregon and 

 northward to the Arctic Ocean. 



2. S. (?) Fremontii, Watson. Pubescent with scattered short spreading hairs, 

 the branching woody base with few remnants of old leaves : stems 2 to 4 inches 

 high : leaves less than half an inch long, pinnate with 1 to 3 pairs of linear leaflets, 

 which are strongly nerved and somewhat revolute : sepals smooth, ovate to broadly 

 oblong, less than a line long, the white petals twice longer : pods (not mature) 2 to 

 3 lines long, somewhat obcompressed, obtuse at base and scarcely attenuate above, 

 beaked with the short thick style ; valves faintly nerved : seeds small, 10 or more 

 in each cell ; cotyledons obliquely incumbent. — Proc. Am. Acad. xi. 123. 



Hills around Klamath Lake (FremamC) ; Sierra Co. (?), Lcmmon. Much resembling the last 

 species in habit, but referred to the genus with doubt as the fruit is apparently abnormal in being 

 comparatively obtuse and terete, and in the obliquity of the cotyledons. 



17. NASTURTIUM, R. Brown. 



Pod oblong or short-linear, terete or nearly so : valves nerveless. Seeds in 2 

 rows, small, turgid : cotyledons accumbent. — Growing in water or in moist places, 

 smooth or nearly so, with white or yellow flowers, and with the leaves (in our spe- 

 cies) pinnatifid or lyrate. 



A genus widely distributed, of scarcely 20 species according to Bentham and Hooker, but many 

 more are recognized by most authors. There are about 10 native American species, chiefly 

 confined to the Mississippi Valley and the region westward. 



* Flowers small, pale yellow : stems not rooting : leaves pinnatifid or toothed. 



1. N. palustre, DC. A stout biennial, glabrous, erect, 1 to 3 feet high, branch- 

 ing : leaves lanceolate, lyrately pinnatifid, petioled, 2 to 6 inches long : petals a 

 line long : pods oblong, 3 to 4 lines long, equalling the spreading pedicels, acutish 

 at each end or obtuse above, tipped by the prominent style. 



Var. hispidum, Fischer & Meyer. Somewhat hispid : pods shorter, globose- 

 oblong, 2 lines long. 



Near the eastern border of the State in Truckee Valley ( Watson), and common north and east- 

 ward, from Arctic America to the Gulf of Mexico. 



2. N. curvisiliqua, Nutt. Annual or biennial, smooth, usually erect, J to 1 

 foot high : leaves narrowly oblong or oblanceolate, pinnatifid with oblong usually 

 toothed lobes, rarely only sinuate-toothed : petals a little exceeding the sepals : pods 

 rather slender, 4 to 6 lines long ; style prominent or none ; pedicels usually nearly 



