32 
James Small. 
Considering the various tribes, we find that yellow from its 
prevalence and low colour value is presumably the primitive colour 
for the order. Yellow is the predominant colour in the disc florets 
in all tribes in which the disc and ray arrangement occurs, and the 
higher colours are usually present only in the ray florets. 
In the Eupatorieae and Vernonieae no true yellow occurs, thus 
strengthening the hypothesis that these are end groups. Red,' 
purple and blue are common in the Eupatorieae, but blue seldom 
occurs in the Vernonieae. The absence of blue when purple is 
common is of little importance, especially when blue is found’ 
although not very frequently, in the Astereae. Yellow, white and 
reds of various shades are typical of the Astereae, Heliantheae, 
Helenieae and Anthemideae. The Inuleae are nearly always yellow, 
both in disc and ray florets, another point which justifies the 
removal of this tribe from the vicinity of the Astereae towards the 
Senecioneae. The Senecioneae show violet and red in a few genera 
but the genus Senecio, which comprises over 1,300 species, has 
both disc and ray florets yellow, except in some of the more 
specialised sections, which have been separated from time to time 
as distinct genera, but which are included in the genus by Hoffmann 
(14). The Calenduleae and Arctotideae are usually yellow, both in 
ray and disc, but the ray florets may be white or purple. Only 
half-a-dozen genera in the Cichorieae show blue flowers and the 
actual number of blue species form a small proportion of the tribe 
in which the predominant colour is yellow. Red and white flowers 
also occur occasionally in this group and the pure blue flowers are 
possibly an expression of the vigour of the recent and actively 
developing group which other data prove the Cichorieae to be. The 
Mutisieae and Cynareae are usually red, purple or blue, yellow 
occurring more frequently in the former tribe and thus the placing 
of the Mutisieae below the Cynareae is supported even by the 
distribution of colour in the tribes. That the blue and purple of the 
Astereae and Cynareae is highly developed, similar to that in the 
Eupatorieae and Vernonieae, is indicated by the fact that such flowers 
are not known to give yellow varieties. 
It will be seen that, although it is hardly possible to distinguish 
clearly the colour values of some of the central tribes, it is possible 
to decide that there is at least nothing in the distribution of colour 
in the order which is contrary to the previous suggestions of 
phylogeny, and that the colour of the corolla in these groups where 
the variation is not too wide, confirms the conclusions derived from 
other data. 
