1904] Brainerd, — Hybridism in the Genus Viola 217 



Last June I received among other plants three specimens of what 

 seemed to be this hybrid from Mr, L. W. Watson of Charlottetown, 

 Prince Edward Island. But the trouble was that though V.-septentrio- 

 ?ialis was common, V. Jimbriatula had never been reported from that 

 region, and was not known to occur in the Province of Quebec, or in 

 northern Maine and New- Brunswick. At my request Mr. Watson 

 kindly revisited the station, and succeeded in finding there excellent 

 specimens of V. Jimbriatula. We are taught in inductive logic that 

 one of the best possible verifications of an hypothesis is its ability to 

 anticipate the discovery of facts not before observed. 



2. Viola fimbriatula x cucullata. This I found in Salisbury, 

 Vt., along a trout brook that crossed a sterile pasture at the base of 

 the mountains. Along the edge of the water and in moist hollows 

 V. cucullata was common, with short petioles and peduncles when 

 growing in the open, and with long petioles and peduncles when 

 growing in the shade of alders. On the drier knolls back from the 

 brook were colonies of V. fimbriatula. Beside them I observed last 

 May plants with wider leaves and larger less decidedly purple flow- 

 ers marked with a ring of dark-blue at the center. They were exam- 

 ined again in August, and some eight of the plants removed to the 

 garden; the cleistogamous flowers and fruit of autumn, as well as 

 the foliage and the vernal flowers, revealed a plant midway between 

 the two familiar species with which it grew ; but no capsule ripened 

 more than four seeds. 



I also collected a similar plant in Cheshire, Berkshire Co., Mass., 

 Aug. 26, 1903. V. cucullata WAS found near by, and V. fimbriatula 

 is a common plant of the region. The specimen has two green fresh 

 cleistogamous flowers, three somewhat more advanced but brown and 

 withered as though entirely unfertilized, and one green capsule 

 shorter than the sepals and containing only three seeds but numer- 

 ous aborted ovules. 



Just such a plant as these is described and figured by Mr. C. L. 

 Pollard in the Bulletin of the Torrey Club (xxiv. 404) as Viola 

 Porteriaiia. It was collected at Bushkill Falls, Pa., May 31, 1897. 

 Mr. Pollard in the article states that an abundance of V. fimbriatula 

 was collected on the same excursion ; and I have noted in the 

 National Herbarium and the Bronx Park Herbarium specimens of 

 V. cucullata., collected at the same place and time, one by Mr. Pol- 

 lard and one by Dr. Britton. Profr. Greene (Pitt. iii. 256) undertakes 



