Lobelia umbellifera McVaugh

Lobelia umbellifera McVaugh, Bull. Torrey Club 67: 144. 1940.
lyihelia faicieulala Donn. Smith, Hot. Gaz. 27: 338. 1899. Not lobelia Jasciculata Kuntze, 1891.
Perennial from fusiform, woody-tuberous roots, these up to 0.7 cm. thick and 7 cm. long; plant delicate, the stems up to I mm. in diameter at base, 10-15 cm. long, nearly smooth, gUbroua, somewhat roughened l>elow (as seen un'Icr a lens), green above and usually purplish below, erect or decumbent, often with 1-5 erect or ascending branches; leaves cauline, 10-25 on each stem, closely grouped in a distance of 5-8 cm. on the lower part of the stem, spreading nearly horizontally or even somewhat reflexed, firm, smooth beneath, sparsely strigose above, especially near base and margin, the margin coarsely crenate, with 2-5 teeth on each side, the blades 2-3.5 (6) mm. wide by S-13 (20) mm. long, 2-4 times as long as wide, the lowest leaves often obovate, obtusely rounded at tip and cuneate at base, the middle and upper leaves relatively narrower, elliptic, usually acute at base and apex, nearly all leaves somewhat decurrent, subsessile; inflorescence a terminal subumbellate cluster, the 1-6 flowers arising nearly together at the summit of a naked peduncle 2-5 cm. long (the inflorescence axis itself is occasionally as much as 2.5 cm. in length); pedicels filiform, 5-12 mm. long in fruit, short-pricklypubescent, apparently ebracteolate, green or purplish; flower-bracts clustered at the bases of the pedicels, nearly linear, up to 1 mm. wide by 7 mm. long, smooth, acute at tip, the cluster of bracts simulating an involucre; flower 11-12 mm. long, including hypanthium; corolla blue (?), glabrous or nearly so, the tube about 3 mm. long, fenestrate laterally and cleft dorsally almost to the very base, its long axis somewhat obHque to that of the hypanthium, the lobes of the lower lip reflexed, spreading, spatulate, mucronate, 3-4 mm. wide by 6-7.5 mm. long, the two upper lobes narrowly spatulate, erect, about 2 mm. wide by 5 mm. long; filament-tube 1.7-2.0 mm. long, the filaments coimate less than one-third their length; anther-tube about 1.3 mm long, included in the corolla-tube, the two smaller anthers tufted at tip with a dense cluster of long white cottony hairs, the three larger anthers short-tufted or merely roughened at tip; hypanthium in anthesis short-campanulate or cup-shaped, glabrous, or strigose at base, somewhat oblique, in fruit more or less inflated, 3-7 mm. wide and high, usually purplish (in dried material dark bluish-black) ; calyx-lobes lanceolate, green, glabrous, somewhat foliaceous, callose-denticulate, acute but with a rather blunt point, up to 1 mm. wide and 4.5 mm. long; seeds ellipsoid, brown, lustrous, about 0.7 mm. long.
Type locality: Plains at the summit of the Cordillera at 3000 m., between Todos los Santos and Chiantla, Huehuetenango, Guatemala, Selcr 3022 (isotype, Gray!).
Distribution: Mountains of Guatemala and adjacent Chiapas, mostly at elevations of 3000 m. and above.