-I 
1911] Fernald,— Northern Variety of Gaylussacia dumosa 9 
and Bigelow made the discriminating observation: ‘‘Very nearly 
allied to V. dumosum of Pursh, and perhaps only a variety. Its 
aquatic growth and hirsute berries, which I do not find mentioned 
by American botanists, have led me to separate it from that species, 
with which it is usually considered synonymous." ! Torrey, treating 
Vaccinium dumosum Andr. as synonymous with V. hirtellum Ait., 
took them both up as Gaylussacia hirtella (Ait.) T. & G. and stated 
that in New York it grew in ‘‘borders of ponds, and in wet sandy 
soils," ? Fowler in his Plants of New Brunswick listed it only from 
“a peat bog." ? Rand & Redfield found it on Mt. Desert Island only 
“in sphagnum bogs” * and the Connecticut Flora lists it only from 
“sphagnum bogs.”® Similarly all the material in the Gray Her- 
barium from Newfoundland, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and New 
England, and in the herbarium of the New England Botanical Club, 
comes from sphagnum bogs, boggy margins of ponds or similar habi- 
tats; never from dry soil. " 
As a general rule the bog- and humus-plants of southern New Eng- 
land occur on our mountains or in northern Maine or eastern Quebec 
in drier habitats than with us but only a few species (Cypripedium 
acaule, Pyrola americana, Epigaea repens, Gaultheria procumbens, 
etc.) of our silicious or acid soils reverse the principle and northward 
seek the sphagnum bogs and wet mossy woods. And whenever this 
singular reversal of habitats is noted we naturally inquire if there 
may not be some specific or varietal distinction between the northern 
and southern plants. In some cases no very apparent difference is 
found and in Gaylussacia dumosa the only striking difference which 
at first appears is that, as a rule the southern plant has narrower 
leaves than the northern — generally oblanceolate in outline, while 
the leaves of the northern plant tend more to be elliptic- or oblong- 
obovate; but this is only a tendency and breaks down in a long suite 
of specimens. A close study of the two series, however, shows that 
in the northern plant the leaves and the bracts of the inflorescence are 
always copiously glandular-dotted on both surfaces, while in the 
southern plant of dry soils the upper faces of the leaves and bracts 
are usually quite glandless, though occasionally glandular when first 
1 Bigelow, Fl. Bost. ed. 2, 152, (1824). 
2 Torr. Fl. N. Y. i. 448 (1843). 
3 Fowler, Prelim. List Pl. N. B. 41 (1885), 
4 Rand & Redfield, Fl. Mt. Desert, 124 (1894). 
5 Ct. Geol. Nat. Hist. Surv. Bull. xiv. 312 (1910). 
