Verbena. VERBENACEiE. 335 



§ 2. Leaves sessile or nearly so and entire : spikes lax : tube of (purple or white) 

 corolla exserted, and limb 6 to 9 lines broad : fruit somewhat shorter than the 

 narrow cylindrical calyx-tube. Peculiar species. 



B. spatulata, Torr. Suffrutescent, puberulent : branches terete, very leafy : leaves 

 thickish, obovate, entire, obtuse, mucronate (9 lines long) ; upper ones passing into similar 

 foliaceous bracts; uppermost lanceolate, about equalling the calyx. — Bot. Mex. Bound. 

 126. — S. W. Texas, canon of the Rio Grande, near Mount Carmel, Parry. 



B. linif olia, Gray. Fastigiately and alternately branched from a perennial or suffrutes- 

 cent base, a foot or two high, glabrous and smooth : branches rigid, striate-angled and 

 sulcate, very leafy : leaves linear-lanceolate, entire, acute at both ends, 1-nerved ; upper- 

 most passing into bracts of the loose spike : upper bracts subulate, much shorter than the 

 slightly pedicellate striate calyx : throat of corolla f unnelf orm. — Am. Jour. Sci. ser. 2, 

 xvi. 98 ; Torr. 1. c. — Dry bed or banks of the San Pedro and Rio Grande, S. W. Texas, 

 Wright, Schott. 



3. VERBENA, Tourn. Vervain. (Roman name of a sacred herb, of 

 Celtic derivation.) — A large genus of herbs (or a few S. American species suf- 

 fruticose), chiefly American, some mere weeds, some ornamental; fl. summer. 

 Spontaneous hybrids abound, not here to be described ; many are noted by En- 

 gelmann in Am. Jour. Sci. xlvi. (1843) 99. 



§ 1. Flowers small or comparatively so, in narrow spikes: anthers unappen- 

 daged. 



# Spikes filiform, with the flowers or at least the fruits scattered, naked, and the inconspicuous 

 bracts shorter than the calyx. 



-1— Leaves 1-2-pinnately cleft or incised, sessile or nearly so. 



V. officinalis, L. Annual, slender : stem glabrous or nearly so : leaves minutely strigu- 

 lose-pubescent, chiefly once or twice pinnatifid or 3-5-cleft ; lower obovate, sometimes only 

 incised, narrowed below into a tapering base ; uppermost lanceolate : spikes very slender, 

 solitary or panicled : bracts shorter than calyx : lobes of the small purplish corolla usually 

 less than a line long. — Fl. Dan. t. 628 ; Lam. 111. t. 17. V. officinalis & V. spuria, L. 

 Spec. i. 18. — Road-sides and old fields, New Jersey to Texas, Arizona, and S. California. 

 (Nat. from Eu., &c.) 



V. xutlia, Tifthm. Stouter and taller (2 or 3 feet high, from a perennial root 1 ), hirsute- 

 pubescent : leaves more or less canescent, incisely pinnatifid or laciniate, or some of the 

 lower 3-parted ; lobes coarsely toothed : flowers more crowded in the strict spikes, larger : 

 bracts equalling the calyx : lobes of the purple or blue corolla commonly a line and a half 

 long. — Ind. Sem. Hamb. 1834, & Linn. x. Literb. 115. V. strigosa, Hook. & Arn. Comp. Bot. 

 Mag. i. 176, not Cham. V. Lucmana, Walp. Rep. iv. 23 ; Schauer in DC. Prodr. xi. 547. 

 V. cmrulea, Vatke in App. Ind. Sem. hort. Berol. 1876, 1. V. sororia, Don, Prodr. Fl. Nepal. 

 104, & Brit. Fl. Gard. t. 202, is perhaps the same species. — Louisiana and Texas, southern 

 borders of California. (Mex.) 



H t— Leaves merely serrate, or sometimes sparingly incised : root perennial. 



V. urticsefolia, L. From minutely hirsute-pubescent to almost glabrous, 3 to 5 feet 

 high: leaves thin, petioled, ovate to oblong-lanceolate, acuminate or acute, evenly or 

 doubly serrate: spikes slender-filiform, panicled, more or less sparsely flowered: bracts 

 ovate, acuminate, shorter than the short calyx : corolla » line or two, and lobes only half 

 a line long, white, sometimes bluish or purplish. — Waste or open grounds, Canada to 

 Texas, &c. (Trop. Am.) 



V. polystachya, HBK. Less tall, more scabrous, sometimes hirsute or hispid, panicu- 

 lately branched: leaves from oblong to broadly lanceolate (1 or 2 inches long), sessile by a 

 narrowed base or short-petioled, obtuse or acute, incisely serrate, occasionally somewhat 

 lobed : spikes thicker and denser than in the preceding. — Gray, Bot. Calif, i. 608. V. poly- 

 stachya, biserrata, & veroniccefolia 1 HBK. Nov. Gen. & Spec. ii. 274, &c. V. C'aroliniensis, 

 Dill. Elth. ii. 407, t. 301, fig. 388 : therefore V. Carolina, L. Spec. ed. 2, ii. 29, but not in 

 Carolina. V. Caroliniana, Spreng. Syst. ii. 748; Hook. & Arn. Bot. Beech. 156; Schauer 

 in DC. 1. c. 546. California and Arizona : rare. (Mex.) 



