80 ; Rhodora [APRIL 
Picea mariana, Betula lenta, Ulmus fulva, Robinia Pseudo-Acacia, 
Acer Negundo, Tilia americana, Nyssa sylvatica, etc., are much better 
understood than they were ten years ago. 
To those unacquainted with the source of information the statement 
under the range of the Slippery Elm: “In New ENGLAND — Maine 
— District of Maine, rare," will be surprising for the “ District of 
Maine" is not a portion of the state but was the recognized designa- 
tion of the whole area in colonial days. Dame & Brooks, from whom 
Blakeslee derived his statement, had said: * Maine,— District of 
Maine (Michaux, Sylva of North America, ed. 1853, III, 53), rare." 
In the days when Michaux explored eastern America Maine was the 
“District of Maine." But in spite of slips and minor inaccuracies 
due to the method of preparation of the book it is, as already said, 
a very attractive volume and one which many New Englanders will be 
happy to possess.— M. L. F. 
SALIX SERISSIMA IN SOUTHERN CONNECTICUT.— When the remark- 
able late-fruiting Salix serissima (Bailey) Fernald was discussed in 
Ruopora (vi. 3-8) in 1904 it was known in New England only from 
swamps of the Stockbridge limestone region of Berkshire County, 
Massachusetts and Litchfield County, Connecticut; and in the 
Catalogue of Flowering Plants and Ferns of Connecticut (1910) it is 
recorded only from Norfolk and Salisbury in northern Litchfield 
County. In the herbarium of the Agricultural Experiment Station 
at New Haven, however, there is a characteristic specimen (originally 
labeled S. lucida) collected by J. A. Allen in a “swamp near Westville, 
Ct., June 17, 1880." Westville is in southern New Haven County, 
very near the band of diabase dikes which extends from the central 
part of Orange to the eastern part of Woodbridge (see Geology of 
Connecticut, 113), and nearly fifty miles from the other known sta- 
tions for Salix serissima. The occurrence of the shrub at this point 
suggests the probability that search will reveal it in other swamps 
near the diabase dikes of Fairfield, Bridgeport, Derby, Orange, Wood- 
bridge, Seymour, Bethany, and Cheshire; for the rock of these dikes 
is composed of labradorite (a lime-soda feldspar) and pyroxene (con- 
taining magnesia, iron, and lime) and should furnish to the neighbor- 
ing swamps a considerable amount of calcareous soil. The finding 
of Salix serissima at Westville suggests also the desirability of watch- 
ing for it in swamps which receive drainage from the trap ridges of 
central Connecticut.— M. L. FERNALD, Gray Herbarium. 
Volume 14, no. 159, including pages 41 to 56, was issued 6 March, 1912. 
