[Illustration:  HELIANTHUS RIGIDUS (SYN.  HARPALIUM RIGIDUM).]

H. rigidus is well known as the best of the perennial sunflowers, and has many synonyms, the commonest Harpalium rigidum.  It need not be described, but one or two things about it may be noted.  The shoots, which come up a yard or more from last year’s stalk, may be transplanted as soon as they appear without injury to the flowering, but if put back to the old center, the soil, which should be deep and light, ought to be enriched.  The species is variable, and improved forms may be expected, as it produces seed in England.  The number of ray flowers is often very large.  I have one form which has several rows of them, nearly hiding the disk.  A variety is figured in Botanical Magazine, tab. 2,668, under the name of H. atro-rubens.  Another comes in the same series, tab. 2,020, as H. diffusus.  Other synonyms are H. missuricus and H. missouriensis.  Its native range extends across North America in longitude, and covers many degrees of latitude.  It likes a dry soil.  In wet soil and wet seasons the flower-stalk is apt to wither in the middle, and the bud falls over and perishes prematurely.

[Illustration:  COMMON SUNFLOWER (H.  ANNUUS) SHOWING HABIT OF GROWTH.]

H.  Laetiflorus.—­Under this name we grow in England a tall, much-branched, late flowering kind, with smooth and very stout and stiff stalks, sometimes black, sometimes green.  It increases at the base of the stalks; it makes close growth, and shows little disposition to run at the root.  The flowers are rather small, not more than 9 inches across, but so durable and so well displayed by the numerous spreading branches as to make the plant very useful for late decoration.  I own that I cannot identify this plant with the laetiflorus of Asa Gray, which he tells us resembles tall forms of H. rigidus, with rough stalks, and bears flowers with numerous rays 11/2 inches long.

[Illustration:  FLOWER OF HELIANTHUS ANNUUS.]

H. occidentalis.—­Recently introduced by Mr. W. Thompson, of Ipswich, who gave me the plant two years ago.  It is a neat species, growing about 2 feet high, well branched, and producing at the end of July abundance of flowers about 2 inches across.  The lower leaves are small and broad, with long stalks, ovate in form.

[Illustration:  HELIANTHUS MULTIFLORUS FL-PL.]

H. mollis, so called from the soft white down with which the leaves are covered, grows about 4 feet high.  Leaves large, ovate, and sessile; growth of the plant upright, with hardly any branches; flowers pale yellow, about 3 inches across, not very ornamental.  Cultivated at Kew, whence I had it.

H. giganteus grows 10 feet high; stem much branched and disposed to curve.  Flowers about 21/2 inches across, produced abundantly in August; rays narrow and pointed, cupped, with the ends turning outward; leaves lanceolate and sessile; rootstock creeping, forming tuberous thickenings at the base of the stems, which Asa Gray tells us were “the Indian potato of the Assiniboine tribe,” mentioned by Douglas, who called the plant H. tuberosus.