PHACELIA BIPINNATIFIDA.—BIPINNATE PHACELIA. 55 
and there is nothing whatever to associate his name with the 
history of the plant, unless some botanical antiquary digs it out 
from the mass of synonyms under which so much lies buried. 
It does not seem fair, but it is the law of botany, and indeed it is 
one of those necessities which must be submitted to. Several 
supposed genera, as for instance Cosmanthus, Whidlavia and 
fiutoca, which once had severally many species under their 
names, are all now regarded by Dr. Gray as sections of Phacelia, 
and this is why the genus seems to have grown so large as it is 
at the present time. 
Our pretty species, Phacclia bipinnatifida, has little to boast of 
in the way of popular history; but it will commend itself to all 
lovers of wild flowers by its simple beauty. It does not appear 
to have been noticed by the older botanists; Michaux in_ his 
“Flora of North America,” in 1803, being the first to name and 
describe it, probably from Kentucky specimens, It is subject to 
some variations, one of sufficient character to have been regarded 
as a distinct species. This is Lhacelia brevistylis of Buckley, 
though now only a variety of Gray, while still retaining its 
original specific name. This particular variety was found in 
Alabama by Professor S. B. Buckley, now the State Geologist 
of Texas. In its geographical relations it is found according to 
Professor Gray, in his “Synopsis,” “in the shaded banks of 
streams, from Ohio and Illinois to Alabama.” It does not seem 
to extend to the lower lands near the coast, and is probably 
not usually met with by collectors along what might be properly 
called the seaboard States. Darby, in his “Botany of the 
Southern States,” does not include it even in so late an edition 
as 1866. Dr. Chapman has it in his “Flora,” but confines it to 
“shaded banks in Alabama and North Carolina.” Professor 
Wood finds it in “ woods and hill-sides, Pennsylvania, to Indiana 
(Plummer), Missouri and Ohio.” We may gather from all this 
that it favors a mountain region, and is partial to the shade of 
open woods. In the “Botanical Gazette” for 1876, the editor 
notices very singular behavior in the plant in his section, Jeffer- 
