228 LOBELIACE^. 



2. 8. asper, Fuchs. (1542). Stouter, the distinctly and acutely angled 

 very leafy stem often an in. thick, the heads irregularly umbellate at its 

 summit: leaves pinnatifid, prickly-margined, the auricles helicoid and 

 appressed to the stem: achenes smooth, 3-nerved on each side. — Nearly as 

 common as the preceding, but more a plant of spring and early summer. 



Oedee lx. LOBELIACE/C. 



Herbs with milky juice, alternate simple leaves, and racemose or 

 scattered irregular flowers. Oalyx-tube adnate to the ovary, the limb 

 divided. Corolla bilabiately lobed or cleft. Stamens 5, alternate with 

 the corolla-lobes; filaments joined into a tube; anthers also united; 

 pollen 12-sided, as in the Cichoriacex. Ovary 1- or 2-celled; style entire. 

 Fruit capsular, many-seeded. 



1. HOWELLIA, A. Gray. Delicate herbs of muddy shores. Calyx 

 with linear-clavate tube wholly adnate to the ovary; limb of 5 segments. 

 Segments of corolla only slightly unequal; tube obsolete. Stamen- tube 

 nearly free, and with the included style, slightly incurved. Capsule 

 membranaceous, 1-celled, few-seeded, bursting irregularly on one side. 



1. H. limosa, Greene. Weak procumbent branches 6 — 12 in. long, 

 leafy and iioriferous throughout: leaves lanceolate, entire, sessile, % in. 

 long: corolla white, the segments 1 line long, cuneiform, the two upper 

 narrower and more widely separated: capsule % in. long, surmounted 

 by the 5 triangular erect calyx- teeth. — Margins of pools on the plains of 

 Solano Co. near Suisun. May. 



2. BOLELIA., Raf. Dwarf herbs of low plains or along lake shores. 

 Calyx-tube very long, stalk-like, wholly adherent to the long slender 

 ovary. Corolla with very short tube and ample bilabiate limb; lips 

 spreading, the larger broad and only toothed or lobed, the divisions of 

 the upper (and smaller) usually distinct. Capsule elongated and linear, 

 many-seeded, dehiscent longitudinally into 3 long valves. 



* Larger lip of corolla merely 3-toolhed or -lobed at apex. 



1. B. insignis, Greene. Stoutish, erect, mostly simple and few- 

 flowered: lower lip of the very large corolla % in- broad, obovoid, 

 3-lobed, the lobes and lateral parts of the body sky-blue marked with 

 darker veinlets, the main portion white, bearing in the middle 2 oblong 

 parallel green spots; upper lip merely bifid, the lobes ascending and 

 parallel; throat of corolla with a pair of bright yellow folds in a field of 

 dark violet. — Low plains of the lower Sacramento and San Joaquin. 

 Very different from its far northern ally, B. elegans. May. 



* * Larger lip of corolla trefoil-shaped. 



2. B. pnlchella (Lindl.), Greene. Freely branching, often 6—10 in. 

 high: lower lip of corolla parted into 3 broad oblusish and mucronulale 



