L. Flos-cùculi, L. (Ragged Robin.) Perennial, erect, slightly downy below, viscid above; leaves narrowly lanceolate; flowers in loose panicles; calyx short, glabrous; petals red, 4-lobed, lobes linear.—Moist or marshy places; New Eng. and N. Y. (Adv. from Eu.)
6. ARENÀRIA, L. Sandwort.
Sepals 5. Petals 5, entire, sometimes barely notched, rarely wanting. Stamens 10. Styles 3, rarely more or fewer, opposite as many sepals. Pod short, splitting into as many or twice as many valves as there are styles, few–many-seeded.—Low, usually tufted herbs, with sessile exstipulate leaves and small white flowers. (Name from arena, sand, in which many of the species grow.)—The following sections are by many botanists taken for genera.
§ 1. ARENARIA proper. Pod splitting wholly or part-way down into 3 or at length into 6 valves; seeds many, naked at the hilum.
A. serpyllifòlia, L. (Thyme-leaved Sandwort.) Diffusely branched, roughish (2–6´ high); leaves ovate, acute, small; cymes leafy; sepals lanceolate, pointed, 3–5-nerved, about equalling the petals and 6-toothed pod.—A low annual; sandy waste places. June–Aug. (Nat. from Eu.)
§ 2. ALSÌNE. Pod splitting to the base into 3 entire valves; seeds many, usually rough, naked at the hilum; flowers solitary and terminal or cymose; root in our species perennial, except in n. 4.
[*] Leaves small, rigid, awl-shaped or bristle-shaped.
1. A. Caroliniàna, Walt. (Pine-barren S.) Densely tufted from a deep perpendicular root; leaves closely imbricated, but spreading, awl-shaped, short, channelled; branches naked and minutely glandular above, several-flowered; sepals obtuse, ovate, shorter than the pod. (A. squarrosa, Michx.)—In pure sand, S. New York, N. J., and southward along the coast. May–July.
2. A. Michaùxii, Hook. f. Erect, or usually diffusely spreading from a small root, smooth; leaves slender, between awl-shaped and bristle-form, with many others clustered in the axils; cyme diffuse, naked, many-flowered; sepals pointed, 3-ribbed, ovate, as long as the pod. (A. stricta, Michx.)—Rocks and dry wooded banks, Vt. and Penn. to Minn., Mo., and southwestward. July.
3. A. vérna, L. Dwarf, alpine, densely matted, glabrous or (var. hirta) somewhat pubescent, 1–3´ high; leaves narrowly linear or awl-shaped; flowers loosely cymose; sepals lanceolate, pointed, 3-nerved, shorter than the pod. —Smuggler's Notch, Vt. (Pringle); north and westward. (Eu.)