64 Rhodora [Marcu 
erally thin and sterile that it supports but little herbaceous vegetation 
especially on the south side of the hill which is very steep and not per- 
fectly screened by the trees from the scorching rays of the midsummer 
sun. Yet it is on this very southern slope and about midway between 
the base and summit of the hill (which has an elevation of some seventy 
feet) that the Skunk Cabbage grows, not, however, in the ground but 
in a crevice at the foot of a white oak of medium size. Here it has 
found conditions evidently congenial and perhaps in some respects 
not unlike those which obtain in swamps; for the cavity is, in effect, 
a deep, narrow-mouthed, wooden bowl which receives and retains the 
rain water that falls directly into it and, in addition, very much of that 
which drives against the trunk of the tree and trickles downward 
towards its base. Owing to this abundant supply of moisture the soil 
which fills the bowl and which is made up partly of decayed wood 
and partly of the remains of disintegrated leaves, is almost always 
moist and frequently of the consistency of semi-liquid mud. 
When I first noticed the Skunk Cabbage in midsummer, some 
twelve or fifteen years ago, it must have been very young for its light 
green leaves were then no longer than those of our common red clover. 
It has since increased in stature steadily, if somewhat slowly, until it 
has become a well-grown and vigorous-looking plant. As nearly as 
I have been able to ascertain, however, it has not bloomed as yet. 
Perhaps it will not live to do so, for gypsy and brown-tailed moths are 
attacking the trees that shelter it and the entire hillside is likely to be 
stripped of foliage in the course of the next two or three years. 
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS. 
CRYPTOGRAMMA STELLERI IN New HawrsuiRnE.— It may be of 
interest to the readers of RHopoRA to have put on record the finding 
of Cryptogramma Stelleri (Gmel.) Prantl in northern New Hampshire. 
On 16 July, 1907, Mr. A. H. Moore and I discovered a good-sized 
station. of this fern on shaded dryish cliffs in the town of Cole- 
brook. I should be interested to know whether it has been pre- 
viously found in New Hampshire. — ARTHUR STANLEY PEASE, 
Cambridge, Massachusetts. 
Vol. 12, no. 122, including pages 17 to 32 and plate 78, was issued 
16 March, 1909. 
