SlGfiliGATIlS 0» KfitS. 14;4 



Wkile its species there are all much reduced in size, they present 

 a goodly array of comparatively ample foliage, on twigs and 

 branches always lithe and flexible ; and the local deviations there 

 from its trifoliolate norm are not at all in the direction of the 

 pinnate, but just the opposite ; for in the very centers of aridity 

 the Schmaltzias in several species have simple leaves ; and they 

 are also leaves of fair size, niaking not the least approach to the 

 leaflets of the pinnated Rhus microphylla. So, then, a "true 

 Lobadium with pinnated leaves " would be expected to display, 

 as all others of that genus do, leaflets ample, strongly indented 

 on the margin, and conspicuously veiny ; and we have, moreover, 

 a plain and certain foreshadowing of what such leaves woiild be 

 in S. subpinnata of Colorado, and i". quinata of California, in 

 neither of which is there a hint, even remote, of the peculiar 

 foliage of Rhus microphylla, which itself is most like that of 

 xerophyte leguminous shrubs of the deserts of all continents. 



And the inflorescences in the present type are only rather 

 superficially like those of Schmaltzia. They are solitary always, 

 and sessile; one in each axil. Each flower in the spike is 

 embraced at base by a cup formed of three bracts, while in 

 Schmaltzia each is axillary to a single bract. The flowers in 

 this type are never yellow, always white, and the petals are 

 ciliate. The fruits, always orange or scarlet in Schmaltzia, are 

 dark purple or black in the present type, which I regard as an 

 excellent genils and name it Ehobidium. 



E. MiCEOPHYLLUM (Bngelm). Leaflets 4 to 7, oval, the lowest 

 pair distinctly smaller but still oval, only slightly inequilateral, 

 both faces of all scantily villous-strigulose. 



Widely dispersed in western Texas, doubtless also across 

 the Kio Grande in Mexico ; the type Charles Wright's n. 1341. 

 In middle Texas, on the border region between the arid and the 

 humid sections, there is another species. 



E. QLABELLUM. Leaflets 9, larger, elliptic-oblong, the odd 

 one not larger than the pair next it, the lowest pair slightly 

 obovate. obtuse, slightly yet distinctly unequal at the not rounded 

 base, all appearing glabrous above and very smooth, a lens show- 

 ing scattered stiff appressed hairs. 



