4 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [january 



Hookeri) velutina. 2 Since making these experiments (1912-1913) 



I have cultivated O. blandina so as to reduce the paleness of its 



leaves to the first youth of the rosettes, and to have no diminution of 



the individual strength of my seed-bearing specimens on account of it. 



At the time of flowering the plants are much more slender than 



those of O. Lamarckiana, and are in their main features very much 



like the velutina hybrids of 0. biennisX Lamar xkiana and of 0. 



Lamar ckianaXO. biennis Chicago, and especially like the latter, 



with which in some instances they can easily be confounded. The 



leaves on the stem are narrow, reaching about two-thirds the 



breadth of those of Lamar xkiana if compared by equal length. In 



the beginning they are folded along their midvein, but later they 



become flattened, and this curious character may then be seen 



only in the bracts of the inflorescence. The bubbles, which are so 



characteristic of the leaf blades of O. Lamar xkiana, are absent in 



the mutant. I shall designate this lack of bubbles by the term 

 "smooth." 



The flowers of O. blandina are cup-shaped, whereas those of the 



or less quadrangular. The size is the same, 



more 



bright, and the stamens show no marked 

 pollen is very large in both cases. Th< 



gma 



widely spread out above the anthers, the distance being even some- 

 what larger in the mutant (1 cm. against 0.5cm.). The flower 

 buds are almost twice as thick in the mutant, more regularly and 

 more deeply colored with red brown lines and spots, and much 

 more hairy. This color and this hairiness extend over the tube of 

 the flower and the ovary, and in a less degree over the top of the 



stem and 



mng bracts. The small free tips at 

 thick in O. blandina but thin in O 



The differences of the fruits are small, except for the hairiness. 

 The most striking character of O. blandina, however, is seen at the 

 end of the flowering period, when the spikes are long and the lower 

 fruits begin to ripen. At that period the spikes are very slender, 

 with few fruits and long internodes, whereas on the spike of O. 

 Lamar xkiana the fruits are densely crowded. I counted the fruits 



3 Gruppenweise Artbildung. Berlin, 19 13, p. 164, where O. atrovirens still bears 

 the name of O. cruciata {fig. 73) ; and p. 116, fig. 46. for the twin hybrids of O. Hookeri. 



