1905] Fernald,— An undescribed Comandra 47 
they appear to have been so little observed. While this is their prob- 
able mode of origin, the subject “should by no means be allowed to 
test with conjecture, but the genesis and growth of the balls should 
receive precise scientific study and adequate description. 
SMITH COLLEGE, Northampton, Massachusetts. 
AN UNDESCRIBED NORTHERN COMANDRA. 
M. L. FERNALD. 
In July, 1903, Mr. George H. Richards collected in the sandy 
alluvium of the Grand River, Gaspé County, Quebec, a white-flowered 
Comandra, which in habit suggested both C. umbellata, Nutt., of the 
Atlantic States and C. pallida, A. DC., of the extreme West. The 
specimens were not, however, satisfactorily referable to either of those 
species; so in late June and early July when, with Mr. Richards, I 
visited the salmon-camp of Mr. Louis Cabot, the present owner of 
the Seigniory of Grand River, we made it a special point to search 
for the strange Comandra. The plant was found at several stations, 
but only occasionally in flower. Later in July, it was found in dry 
sandy woods at Tadousac, at the mouth of the Saguenay, and in 
September was collected in ripe fruit at the same station. 
Study of this Comandra of eastern Quebec shows that it is a 
plant of broad northern range, extending across Canada to Saskatche- 
wan and Assiniboia, south to the Great Lakes, Missouri, and Kansas. 
Throughout this extensive range the plant holds the characteristics 
noted on the Grand River and at Tadousac. Compared with C. 
umbellata of the Eastern States,—from central Maine to Wisconsin 
and Georgia — the more northern species is low, the fertile branches 
0.5—2.5 dm. high, those of C. umbellata ranging from 1.5-4 dm.; the 
more crowded leaves are thicker, scarcely paler beneath, and when 
dry with green inconspicuous reticulate veins, the fewer thinner 
leaves of C. umbellata being somewhat whitened beneath and with 
the pale midrib prominent beneath. The inflorescence of the north- 
ern plant is a rather dense corymb, made up of 2-6-flowered cymules 
on strongly ascending rays; that of C. umbellata is an ellipsoid-oblong 
panicle with the cymules of smaller more numerous flowers on diver- 
gent rays. 
