Vernonia. COMPOSITE. 89 



bristle. — Proc. Am. Acad. xv. 47. (Echinophorce affinis Mariana, etc., Pluk. Mant. 66, t. 388, 

 fig. 6 ?) E. scaber, Michx. Fl. in part ; Torr. & Gray, Fl. 1. c, not L. E. nudicaulis, Ell! 

 in herb. Hook., not of Sk. 1. c. — Low and sandy woodlands, Delaware (Canby) to Georgia, 

 W. Louisiana, and Arkansas (Harvey). 



3. VERN6NIA, Schreb* Iron-weed. ( Win. Vernon, an early collector 

 in Virginia, &c.) — Perennial herbs (or some in the tropics shrubs) ; with alter- 

 nate and pinnately-veined leaves, and usually purple or rose-colored flowers, 

 occasionally varying, to white. — Gen. 541; DC. Prodr. v. 15 ; Torr. & Gray, 

 Fl. ii. 57 ; Benth. & Hook., Gen. ii. 227. — A huge genus, of nearly 400 species, 

 the greater part S. American, some S. African and S. Asian ; the N. American 

 species all of the section Lepidaploa, Benth. & Hook. 1. c. {Lepidaploa, &c, Cass.), 

 having somewhat spherical heads in terminal cymes or terminating corymbiform 

 branches. Ours all many-flowered; the (fuscous or even ferruginous) pappus 

 persistent or nearly so, and double ; akenes commonly sprinkled or beset with 

 resinous atoms between the salient ribs ; foliage often puncticulate. Fl. late 

 summer and autumn. The species are extremely difficult : there are spontaneous 

 hybrids between such very different species as V. Arkansana and V. Baldwinii, 

 V. faseiculata and V. Baldwinii, and even between V. Baldwinii and V. Lind- 

 heimeri ! 



# Stems leafy throughout: short outer pappus conspicuous, and squamellate rather than setose. 

 -t— Heads large, sometimes an inch high, 50-70-flowered. 



V. Arkansana, DC. Tall (8 or 10 feet), rather glabrous: leaves all linear-lanceolate 

 (4 to 12 inches long and lines wide), attenuate-acuminate, runcinately denticulate : heads all 

 on simple and somewhat clavate peduncles, nearly hemispherical : involucre green, very 

 squarrose ; its bracts all equaUing the disk, and with long filiform tips (those of the upper 

 reddish), the outer and loose ones filiform nearly or quite to the base : akenes minutely 

 hispid on the ribs. — Prodr. vii. 264 ; Nutt. in Trans. Am. Phil. Soc. n. ser. vii. 283 ; Torr. & 

 Gray, Fl. ii. 59;. Torr. in Sitgreaves Exped. t. 2. — Plains and alluvial banks of streams, 

 Missouri and Kansas to E. Texas. 



H— -i— Heads smaller, half-inch high or less, 15-40-flowered, rarely only 10-flowered. 

 ++ Leaves slightly or not at all scabrous, and without revolute margins, most of them acutely den- 

 ticulate or serrate with rigid or somewhat spinulose teeth, varying from linear-lanceolate to 

 oblong-ovate, acuminate or very acute, pinnately veined : stems leafy up to the inflorescence ; 

 cymes mostly compound. (Species not clearly limited.) 



= Akenes under a lens more or less hispidulous on the ribs. 



V. Noveboracensis, Willd. Somewhat glabrous or pubescent, 3 to 6 feet high : leaves 

 from elongated- to oblong-lanceolate (3 to 9 inches long) : heads in an open cyme, 20-40- 

 flowered : involucre commonly brownish or dark purplish ; the ovate and ovate-lanceolate 

 bracts (or at least the upper ones) abruptly acuminate into a slender cusp or slender tortuous 

 awn, usually some of the lower wholly aristiform and loose. — Spec. iii. 1632; DC. Prodr. 

 v. 63 ; Torr. & Gray, Fl. ii. 57. Serratula Noveboracensis (founded on Herm. Parad. Bot., 

 & Dill. Elth. 355, t. 263) and S. prcealta (in herb, and of Dill. Elth. t. 264, bracts more 

 aristate than the fignre shbws), L. Spec. ii. 818. V. prcealta, Less, in Linn. iv. 264 ; Hook. 

 Fl. i. 304. V.tomentosa, Ell. Sk. ii. 288 (Chrysocoma tomentosa, Walt. Car. 196), a form 

 with tomentulose pubescence. Varies with pale or sometimes white instead of pink-purple 

 corollas, the involucre then greenish. — Low grounds, coast of New England to Georgia, 

 west Jo Wisconsin and Missouri, but mostly an eastern species. 



Var. latif olia. Lower, 2 to 5 feet high : leaves oblong-ovate or broadly lanceolate, 

 pale or glauceseent beneath, the larger more coarsely serrate : heads fewer : involucre vary- 

 ing from hemispherical (of fewer bracts) to somewhat turbinate, and its bracts merely acute, 

 acuminate, mucronate, or some with a short filiform cusp. — Serratula glauca, L. 1. c, founded 

 on Dill. Elth. 354, t. 262 ; the specimen has many aristate-tipped bracts. Vernonia glauca 

 (and nearly V. prcealta), Willd. Spec. iii. 1633. V. ovalifolia, Torr. & Gray, 1. c. ; Chapm. 



