42 Rhodora [February 



tical of its occurrence in Rhode Island. Mr. L. L. Dame in his excel- 

 lent little hand book 2 says of it "Rhode Island — not reported," 

 meaning that he had seen no specimen from the state. Sometime 

 during last winter or early in the spring of the present year (1903) Mr. 

 H. W. Preston called the writer's attention to this statement of Mr. 

 Dame's, and suggested that we make special effort to get some herba- 

 rium specimens as both of us recollected having seen a group of the 

 trees within a year in Scituate (Rhode Island), while riding on one 

 of the Danielson electric cars. 



About this time Mr. G. W. Hurlingame sent to the Brown Univer- 

 sity Herbarium, for identification, a specimen of the Black Spruce 

 which was collected, as I learned later, at the station just mentioned. 

 Mr. Preston has since then visited this place and photographed the 

 trees. 



Early in May the writer spent a day about Wakefield Pond, Burrill- 

 ville, in company with Rev. R. F. Cheney of Pascoag. At the time 

 of our visit the water appeared to be higher than usual — though it 

 may not have been — and what looked at a short distance like several 

 •ordinary islands proved, upon closer inspection, to be partially of 

 wholly submerged islands — if such an expression be allowed — often 

 with only the bushes and small trees projecting above the water. 



These trees were nearly all Black Spruce and we counted more than 

 a hundred on three or four of these "islands." Many of the spruces 

 were in fruit while, in some cases, scarcely a meter in height. 

 Perhaps the tallest one we saw was growing on the mainland — it was 

 estimated to be 5 or 6 meters high. It is probable that the Black 

 Spruce occurs at quite a number of stations in northern Rhode Island 

 as it has been reported from at least six different towns, although the 

 writer has personally seen it in but two of them, as stated. — J. 

 Franklin Coi.t.ins, Providence, Rhode Island. 



Panicum Commonsianum in Connecticut. — In June, 1902, and 

 again a year later I collected, in a "sand-blow" in South Windsor, 

 Connecticut, a plant which proves to be Faniium Commonsianum, Ashe. 

 There were a few scattered clumps of it, growing in pure sand, some 

 with Carex siccata and other plants of dry ground, some in places 

 where nothing else had the courage even to try to exist. Mr. Fernald 



■^ Dame and Brooks : Handbook of the Trees of New England (1902), p. 12. 



