122 Cincinnati Society of Natural History. 
sub-sessile, reticulated ; sepals with narrow, slightly margined, re- 
curved points; tails of carpels either filiform and glabrous or appressed 
silky and villous; leaves very variable. 
We have in the preceding an interesting group of what have been 
considered three distinct species, all possessing points in common, and 
comparatively few points of difference. The var. coccinea, lately 
erected to a species by Dr, Engelman, though Buckley characterized 
it as long ago as 1861, under the name of C. Texensis, differs from the 
type Viorna mainly in the color of the flower and the obtuseness of the 
leaflets, points which are very seldom considered sufficient to estab- 
lish a species. Some leaflets on Véorna are obtuse and plainly reticu- 
lated, while the color of the flower is a deep reddish-purple. The var. 
Pitcheri differs in the leaflets being nearly sessile, reticulated, sepals 
with slightly margined points, but principally in having the tails of 
the carpels filiform and glabrous, or silky and villous. 
Now the Viorna seems to be the dominant form. In its distribu- 
tion it overlaps the var. coccinea found in Texas, and at the northwest 
it overlaps var. Pitcherz in Illinois and Iowa. Here then we have a 
species widely spread over the country with several marked varieties, 
and we shall see that there are not sufficient characters to establish 
them as distinct species. The stems in all are alike. The leaves 
vary in the varieties in size and form, but so do they also in them- 
selves. The Pitcheri has leaves acute or obtuse, entire or lobed, ovate 
or lanceolate. The leaves of coccinea vary less, but in the species 
Viorna, they are as variable as in the varieties. The flowers in all 
are almost exactly alike, except as regards color and the presence or 
absence of pubescence. Lastly, the carpels are alike except in the 
Pitcheri, in which we find, according to Dr. Gray,* two forms, one “(leio- 
stylis) with the filiform styles completely glabrous from the first; in the 
other (lasiostylis) they are appressed silky or villous, either only be- 
low or for their whole length.’ There are transitions between them, 
and the form passes into the C. filifera, Benth, of Mexico, which also 
has naked or pilose styles. Certain forms found in Texas, and re- 
ferred to as var. “folius tenuioribus etc.,’’ of reticulata, seem to be 
the same as OC. filifera, Benth., according to specimens in the herbari- 
um at Washington. As this form has been referred by Gray to 
Pitcheri, it will be necessary to reduce the C. jfilifera to a synonym of 
C. Viorna, var. Pitchert. 
* Bot. Mag., 2. c., Dec. 1881. 
