ASCLEPIADACEa:. 241 



of the corolla. Style enlarged above, ending in a reflexed membrane. 

 Stigma obscurely 2-lobed, hispid. Follicles 2, terete, striate. Seeds 

 oblong-cylindric, with no coma. 



1. P. majob (L.), Scop. Stems slender, when young and flowering 

 erect, 1 ft. high, at length procumbent or trailing and several feet long: 

 leaves ovate, 2—3 in. long, short-petioled, finely ciliate: calyx-segments 

 subulate, ciliate, toothed below: corolla blue: tbe limb 1 in. or more in 

 breadth. — Common in moist shady places, as an escape from the gardens; 

 multiplying by rooting at the joints or the ends of the long shoots, but 

 not fruiting with us. Jan. — March. 



Obdeu lxviii. ASCLEPIADACE/E. 



Ours perennial herbs, with milky juice, opposite or whorled entire 

 leaves, and smallish flowers in axillary mostly subglobose umbels. 

 Flowers 5-merous, but carpels 2 only. Stamens joined to the stigma. 

 Pollen in waxy masses. Fruit a follicle. Seeds thin, flat, crowned with 

 a coma of silky down. 



1. ASCLEPIAS, Diosc. Calyx very small; corolla larger, both deeply 

 5-parted, the divisions reflexed. Filaments monadelphous, inserted on 

 the very base of the corolla; a circle of hood-like organs between corolla 

 and stamens being the most conspicuous part of the flower, these with 

 (or sometimes lacking) a horn-like appendage within. Anther cells, 

 with waxy pollen-masses, connected with the stigmatic disk; the body 

 of the anther with a triangular corneous wing widening down to the 

 base of the organ, i. e. to the column. Follicle usually one only from 

 each flower, the other ovary being abortive. 



* Species hoary-tornentose, or almost white. 



1. A. speciosa, Torr. Stout, 2 — 4 ft. high: leaves oblong-ovate, 

 acutish, 4 — 6 in. long, very short-petioled: peduncle longer than the 

 white- woolly pedicels: fl. % in. long, of a dull red-purple; hoods nearly 

 % in. long, ascending or almost spreading, lanceolate, the short inflexed 

 horn not surpassing the anthers: follicle soft-spinous, densely tomen- 

 tose. — Marin and Contra Costa Co. hills; also at Alameda, and in the 

 hiljs to the eastward. 



2. A. eriocarpa, Benth. Stoutish, 2—4 ft. high, the stem often, 

 sharply angled: leaves sometimes 3 or 4 in a whorl, oblong-lanceolate or 

 narrowly oblong, acute, 4—7 in. long, short-petioled: umbels on stout 

 peduncles mostly longer than the pedicels: fl. 3>£ lines long, creamy- 

 white with slight purplish tinge; hoods shorter than the anthers, oblately 

 semiorbicular, open to near the middle of the back, the summits 

 produced inwardly into an acute angle or tooth, nearly enclosing the 

 acute falciform horn.— Napa and Santa Clara counties, and southward. 



