1912]  Deane,— Festuca ovina, var. duriuscula in N. H. 93 
ture more attractive to the botanist than to the agriculturist, for 
the presence of the plant indicates a barren soil. This grass, as well 
as the other Festucas, was submitted to Prof. A. S. Hitchcock and Mrs. 
Agnes Chase of the Department of Agriculture, Washington, Bp. UC, 
They have given them careful examination and have most kindly com- 
municated to me the following notes on the variety. 
Under date of October 19, 1911, Mrs. Chase writes; "'The Festuca 
specimens I have examined and compared with our United States and 
European material. They fall within the duriuscula circle better 
than anywhere else. The whole ovina group is a complex, intergrad- 
ing inextricably. Your plants agree with some determined by Hackel 
as F. ovina duriuscula, except that the leaves of yours are more con- 
spicuously clustered at the base. The European F. ovina v. glauca 
(Lam.) Hack. is like yours in habit, but in your specimens of it the 
panicles as well as foliage are glaucous. This, like duriuscula, has 
glabrous lemmas. The var. glauca is not known to grow in America." 
Prof. Hitchcock writes on February 15, 1912; “I have looked over 
the specimen of Festuca you sent down and I think it is correctly 
named (Festuca ovina var. duriuscula). I have compared it with 
European specimens and have looked up the descriptions in Hackel's 
monograph of the European species of Festuca and also Ascherson and 
Graebner's Synopsis of Middle European plants. Your plant is the 
subvariety trachyphylla Hack. which differs from the typical form of 
duriuscula in having scabrous blades." 
Before the development of the farm, about twenty years ago, by 
Mr. Charles Endicott, the former owner, the area where this variety 
grows was a typical stone field, thickly covered with stones and boul- 
ders of various sizes more or less imbedded in the ground. Many 
such fields are to-day scattered over northern New England. The 
obstructions were removed and, after grading was done, a foreign 
clover was first planted, and this may possibly account for the intro- 
duction of the Festuca ovina L., var. duriuscula (L.) Koch, for it has 
certainly been established there for a number of years. It is in the 
more sterile portions of the field, left by the removal of the larger 
rocks, that this grass flourishes, maturing by the end of June, and it 
is in similar situations in the same field that Euphorbia Cyparissias 
L. fruits so abundantly, as was recorded in Ruopora, xii. 57-61 (1910). 
There is no reason why this European grass should not be found 
elsewhere in New England in suitable localities, and doubtless, now 
