﻿ON THE BOTANY OF JAPAN. 413 



Th-illinm now occurs in a more advanced state : I still regard it as a mere variety 

 of the Alleghanian and Canadian T. erectum, from which it differs only in its generally 

 more dilated leaves (the largest 6 or 7 inches broad), and proportionally shorter 

 peduncle.* The relations of our Eastern American s^iecies with those of the western 

 side of the continent should be scrutinized anew. Our T. certmum, towards its north- 

 western limit in British America, appears to elevate and lengthen its peduncle until 

 it is hard to distinguish, in dried specimens, from the white variety of T. erectum. 

 And this latter species is apparently reproduced in Oregon and California (both with 

 white and with purple petals) as T. ovatfim, Pursh, which in Northern Oregon and in 

 Kamtschatka becomes Pursh's T. ohovatum, which again is probably a northern form 

 of T. grandiflorum. T. sessile reappears in California, under the same variety of forms 

 as in the Alleghany region ; and the characters of T. recurvatum, Beck, of Illinois 

 and Missouri, are carried to an extreme in Pursh's T. 2}etioIatmn, of the interior of 

 Oregon. 



Lindley's Asparagus lucidus [A. falcatus of Thunberg, but hardly of Linnseus) was 

 gathered at Simoda ; and from Hakodadi there is an imdescribed species, unless it be 

 Kunth's A. schoberioides of Java.-f" 



There would seem to be a mixture of European and of Eastern American species of 

 Polygonatum in Japan. Of the former there is P. vulgare (one form of which I sup- 

 pose is P. Japonicum, Morr. & Decaisne) ; of the latter, a j^lant which I cannot dis- 

 tinguish from the American P. giganteum. Both were found at Hakodadi ; and in 

 the same neighborhood, as also at Simoda, were gathered the true European P. multi- 

 florum (the filaments villous with long, many-jointed hairs), and some forms which 

 apparently connect the Caucasian P. jwlganthenium and the Eastern American P. 

 hiflorum with the same species. To this probably belong Kunth's P. Thunhergii, and 

 what I formerly took for P. Jajwiucum. There were also gathered at Simoda two 

 specimens, which may possibly be a peculiar form of P. multiflorum ; but their long 

 and narrow falcate leaves (4 to 7 inches long, and very gradually tapering from near 



* Trillujm ekectum, Liiiu. ; var. Japonicum : pedunculo foliis amplissimis dimidio breviore ; petalis 

 albidis vel purpureis. T. erectum, vai'. album, Gray in Perry, Exped. 2. p. 320. Hakodadi. 



t AsPAKAGUS Wrightii (sp. nov.) : berbaceus, erectus e rbizomate crasso horizontali, glabemmus ; ramis 

 adscendentibus ramulisque striato-angulatis ; foliis squamajformibus scariosis, caulinis basi subcalcaratis iner- 

 mibus ; cladodiis setaceis acutissimis ut videtur compressis subfalcatis (5 - 10 lin. longis) binis temis quinisve ; 

 floribus masculis cum pedicello brevissimo articulatis ; antheris cordato-didymis baud apicatis £lamentis lineari- 

 bus 2 - 3-plo brevioribus. Hakodadi. 



VOL. VI. N£W SERIES. 63 



