1915] Blake,— Notes on the Genus Sabatia 51 
consists of the uppermost portion of a specimen of the plant which has 
long been known as Sabbatia lanceolata (Walt.) T. & G., with long 
opposite linear-filiform-bracted one-flowered peduncles, linear-subu- 
late slightly fleshy calyx-lobes 4-6 mm. long, flowers all 5-parted except 
the terminal which is 6-parted, and oblong-lanceolate acutish petals 
11-12 mm. long (white, according to Clayton). The sheet is marked 
"D. Clayton ex Virginia, Swertia corollis quinquefidis, terminali 
sexfida, pedunculis longissimis, foliis linearibus, Linn. Sys. gen. 284, 
n. 2"; below is another label, crossed out on the sheet, similar except 
that the reference is to “Linn. Spec. 226” instead of to the Genera. 
Although the specimen does not bear Clayton's number 171, cited by 
Gronovius for the species, it may safely be taken as type in view of its 
entire agreement with the very definite points of the Gronovian and 
Linnaean descriptions. The name Sabatia difformis, taken evidently 
from the inconstant difference in number of parts of the lateral and 
terminal flowers, must accordingly replace S. lanceolata. Swertia 
difformis L. has long been referred with more or less doubt by authors 
to Sabatia Flliottii Steud., although its published character of “ pedun- 
culis....oppositis" should have prevented such confusion, since S. 
Elliott. (S. paniculata Ell., not Pursh) belongs to the group with 
alternate branches. Its identity with S. lanceolata was however long 
ago noted by Grisebach in A. DC. Prod. ix. 49 (1845), probably 
following Pursh, Fl. i. 138 (1814), who says: “This [i. e. S. paniculata 
(Michx.) Pursh, with the varieties a. latifolia Pursh (= C. lanceolata 
Walt., Sw. difformis L.) and 8. angustifolia Pursh (= S. paniculata as 
now restricted)] certainly is the long lost Swertia difformis, as the 
specimens in the Herbarium of Clayton, now in possession of Sir 
Joseph Banks, sufficiently prove." What the “specimens” were, 
other than the one under discussion, is not evident, but the use of the 
plural may have been simply another slip on the part of Pursh. Cer- 
tainly this specimen is the only one of Clayton's few Sabatias now 
extant which Pursh could by any possibility have referred to his S. 
paniculata. 
The name Sabatia (Sabbatia) difformis has recently been published 
by Druce, in a long list of new combinations among which American 
botanists will be somewhat surprised to discover Nemopanthus mu- 
eronata [(L.) Trel. 1892] and Chiococca alba [(L.) Hitch. 1893] indi- 
cated as new, among others; but his unfortunate failure to examine 
the type of the species leads him to identify the name with S. Elliottii 
