CRYPTANTHE 



BORAGINACE^ 487 



leaves and small, mostly white, flowers on very short pedicels in 

 scorpioid racemes. Calyx 5-parted or 5-cleft, the segments erect, 

 usually closely embracing the fruit and deciduous, falling with 

 the mature nutlets. Corolla rotate, its tube not surpassing the 

 calyx; usually with 5 scales closing the throat. Stamens includ- 

 ed. Style short. Nutlets attached by the ventral angle or groove 

 from the base up at least one third or one halfway, or for the 

 whole length to an elevated gynobase, the back convex and not 

 carinate nor transversely rugose. 



§ Fruiting calyx closed over the nutlets and falling with them. 



* Sepals lanceolate or linear, traversed by a rigid and stout mid- 

 rib: nutlets thick-walled, opaque or dull. 



C. Fendleri Greene Pitt, i, 120 Rough-hispid : stem erect, 10-12 inches 

 high, paniculately branched, rigid: leaves linear, an inch or more long : 

 segments of the mature calyx 2 lines long, linear, hispid with pungent 

 bristles: nutlets usually alffour maturing and alike, smooth, ovate-acum- 

 inate, hardly a line long, attached for nearly their whole length to the 

 narrow subulate gynobase. Eastern Washington to the Saskatchewan 

 and New Mexico. 



* * Midrib of the narrow setose-hispid sepals not conspicuously if 

 at all thickened: nutlets very smooth and mostly shining, acute or 

 acuminate, with rounded sides and rather thin or brittle pericarp. 



■*- Nutlets conspicuously acuminate, only 1 or very rarely 2 matur- 

 ing, attached for not more than the lower third to the short and nar- 

 row gynobase which it very much surpasses. 



C. flaccida Greene Pitt, i, 115. }fyosotis flaccida Lehm. Cinereous 

 with short appressed pubescence: stem slender, 4-12 inches high, strict, 

 paniculately branched: leaves numerous, linear-spatulate to almost fili- 

 form, erect, often appressed: spikes usually in pairs or 3 together, almost 

 filiform, many-flowered: calyx in fruit erect appressed to the peduncle, 2 

 lines long or more; sepals filiform-linear, thickish below, their bases very 

 hispid with deflexed and strong but not pungent bristles : nutlets subterete, 

 ovate-lanceolate and rostellate-acuminate, the groove of the attachment 

 enlarged at base but not furcate. Common on the dry interior plains, Brit. 

 Columbia to California. 



C. multicaule. Densely hirsute with short erect but not appressed 

 white hairs : stems several from the crown of a rather stout root, strictly 

 erect, 4-10 inches high, simple up to the short somewhat paniculate inflor- 

 escence : lower leaves numerous, linear-spatulate, 1-2 inches long; upper 

 leaves almost filiform, erect, 12-18 lines long : spikes short and rather stout, 

 hispid-hirsute with spreading hairs, an inch or less long, densely-flowered : 

 segments of the calyx acuminate-lanceolate, barely 2 lines long, their bases 

 hispid with spreading white hairs : nutlets subterete, rostellate-ovate, light 

 brown, the groove of the attachment not perceptibly enlarged at the base. 

 Along the Des Chutes river at Sherar's Bridge Oregon. 



C. rostellata Greene Pitt, i, 116. Canescent with a rather sparse ap- 

 pressed pubescence: stem slender, erect, paniculately branched, 4-8 inches 

 high: leaves linear-spatulate to linear-lanceolate, less than an inch long } 

 the lower ones opposite with more or less connate-clasping base, the uppe^ 

 ones smaller and alternate : spikes solitary or geminate, slender, 1-2 inche s 

 long : calyx erect but not appressed to the rachis, about 2 lines long : sepal s 

 filiform-linear, hispid with short spreading but not reflexed somewhat; 

 pungent white bristles: nutlets triangular-ovate, flattish, rostellate-acum. 



