1912] Fernald,— Viola renifolia and V. Brainerdii 87 
only a very few scattered and quickly deciduous hairs. This latter 
plant, with the upper leaf-surfaces glabrous or quickly glabrate, was 
separated by Greene in 1902 as V. Brainerdii, with the statement 
that it is “certainly a far more common plant in northern New 
England and Canada than the kindred species [V. renifolia]," * and 
that it has a more upland habitat. But, although the cautious and 
very accurate student for whom Viola Brainerdii was named has not 
recognized it as a species, he has recently expressed his understanding 
of the question as follows: 
“The type of VIOLA RENIFOLIA Gray is markedly pubescent through- 
out; but the more common form has at least the upper leaf surface 
glabrous, and has been published as a species, V. Brainerdit, by Pro- 
fessor Greene. But the difference between the two plants, though 
perhaps worth naming, is not specifie, according to my conception of 
species." ? 
This commoner extreme of Viola renifolia, with the leaves glabrous 
above, though connected with the pubescent extreme by some 
transitions, is apparently a positive geographic variety and as such 
it should be separated. "That it is, as already stated by Greene and 
by Brainerd, the commoner plant of the two is shown by the fact that 
of the 97 specimens of the species in the Gray Herbarium and the 
herbarium of the New England Botanical Club only 22 are of the 
typical copiously pubescent V. renifolia, while 63 are very good V. 
Brainerdii and 12 represent both extremes under the same label. 
But, although in northern New England and New York the two are 
thus sometimes found together and by some collectors have been taken 
to be trivial variants of the same plant, it is significant that no typical 
V. renifolia seems to have been collected northeast of New England, 
while in the Maritime Provinces, eastern Quebec, western Newfound- 
land and southern Labrador the essentially glabrous V. Brainerdüi 
with bright green leaves is a common plant. Its more northern 
tendency is also indicated by the fact that north of the Straits of 
Belle Isle it is abundant on dry exposed crests where it is associated 
with many arctic-alpine plants such as Poa alpina L., Salix vestita 
Pursh, Cerastium alpinum L., and Saxifraga caespitosa L.; and in the 
mountains of the Gaspé Peninsula it ascends to an altitude of 1100 
meters, where it is found on dry limestone crests with the plants just 
1Greene, Pittonia, v. 89 (1902). 
? Brainerd, Bull. Torr. Bot. Cl. xxxviii. 8 (1911). 
