MUSTARD FAMILY. 



227 



Petals none; plants diffuse or prostrate; leaves pinnatifid 



3. L. bipinuatiji<l a ni. 



Silicle winged at apex with two lobes or teeth and 

 Conspicuously reticulated; dwarfs with mostly prostrate or decumbent 

 stems; wings or teeth approximate or parallel and 



Nearly as long as the body 4. L. latipes. 



Very short 5. L. dictyotum. 



With finer reticulations; teeth divergent. 

 Pedicels erect or ascending, shorter than the silicles; teeth very promi- 

 nent; sinus triangular . . 6. L. striatum. 



Pedicels spreading or retrocurved; larger than the silicles; sinus broad 

 and rounded 7. L. oxycarpum. 



1. L. medium Greene. Tall Pepper-grass. Stem erect, 1 to 



2 ft. high, simple below, paniculately branching above and hearing 

 numerous racemes 2 to 3 or even in. long; herbage ostensibly 

 glabrous; leaves oblanceolate (the radical oblong), narrowed at base 

 to a petiole, sharply serrate, 2 to 3 in. long; rameal leaves linear, 

 serrate only towards the apex, shorter; petals white; silicles round, 

 \\ lines long, nearly as broad, notched at the very narrowly winged 

 apex; pedicels 2 lines long, widely (or even horizontally) spreading. 



Common in Scott Valley, Lake Co. and southward to Napa Valley. 

 Described by Greene as apetalous. 



2. L. nitidum Nutt. Common Pepper-grass. Tongue-grass. 

 Branching from or near the base, 1 to 6 or 10 in. high, the branches 

 mostly simple; herbage glabrous; leaves 4 in. long or less, the upper 

 almost or quite entire, the lower pinnatifid with the rachis ligulate 

 and bearing remote entire or laciniately toothed lobes; petals white, 

 less than 1 line long, obovate, with no distinct claw; stamens 6, hut 

 the 2 shorter mere rudiments; silicles round, with a narrow margin, 

 abruptly notched at apex, 1£ to 2 lines long, plane on the upper 

 face, convex on the lower, often dark purple, glabrous and shining. 



Common everywhere on the Californian plains, low hills and in 

 the valleys. Feb. -Apr. 



3. L. bipinnatifidum Desv. Wayside Pepper-grass. Stems 



3 to 6 in. long, freely branching from the base, diffuse or even pros- 

 trate, the plants often closely matting the ground; herbage light 

 green, puberulent or glabrate; leaves pinnatifid or the lowest bipin- 

 natifid; racemes numerous, dense and rather narrow; petals none; 

 silicles round, nearly 1£ lines long, glabrous, faintly reticulate, the 

 teeth at the apex short and obtuse; fruiting pedicels ascending, 

 scarcely exceeding £ line. 



Common in hard beaten soil, by paths and waysides, throughout 

 California. 



4. L. latipes Hook. Long-winged Pepper-grass. Stems sev- 

 eral from the base, very thick and stout, 1 to 2 in. long, recurved- 

 prostrate; herbage slightly pubescent; leaves pinnatifid with few- 

 linear acute segments, 3 to 5 in. long, the rachis ligulate, 2 lines 

 broad, often dilated into a terminal lanceolate lobe; segments remote. 

 5 to 6 lines long; racemes very dense, £ to \\ in. long; petals broadly 

 spatulate, greenish, rounded at the apex, 1 line long, much exceeding 

 the short sepals; silicles broadly oblong or oval, 3 lines long, 2 lines 



