222 Rhodora [OCTOBER 
ously not a phase of S. herbacea; and when, after reaching this deci- 
sion, we found it abundantly fruiting, the departure from S. herbacea 
became more pronounced, for the new shrub has densely many- 
flowered aments, in fruit 1.5-3 cm. long, resembling those of S. Uva- 
ursi Pursh. 
The latter species, S. Uva-ursi, is the only other trailing willow of 
the New England mountains, but, unlike S. herbacea and the coarser 
shrub of King’s Ravine which occur on wet mossy knolls and banks, 
S. Uva-ursi characterizes the most exposed and arid ledges and 
gravels. The new shrub differs from the common xerophytic S. 
Uva-ursi in many characters. The branches and branchlets of S. 
Uva-ursi are stiff and straightish, the branchlets subascending; 
those of the King’s Ravine shrub very flexuous and closely appressed 
to the moss and humus. In S. Uva-ursi the usually elliptical leaves 
are acute or acutish, whitened beneath, subentire or at most remotely 
serrate, and the surfaces are scarcely if at all papillose; but in the 
King’s Ravine shrub the oblong or narrowly obovate leaves are 
obtuse or rounded at summit, bright green and lustrous beneath as 
well as above, closely crenate-dentate, and (under a lens) distinctly 
papillose above and often beneath. In its ament-characters, so far 
as shown by the fruiting material, the King’s Ravine shrub is very 
similar to S. Uva-ursi, but has longer capsules than are usual in that 
species. 
Altogether the King’s Ravine shrub differs so pronouncedly from 
both of its allies, S. herbacea and S. Uva-ursi, that it seems worthy 
specific separation. It is possible that it long ago originated by the 
hybridization of these two species, but at present it is so uniform and 
characteristic over a large area of the Ravine and so definitely fertile 
that its present status is not open to question. The shrub seems to be 
quite distinct from any described arctic-alpine species and its only 
previous collections seem to have been by Dr. Pease in 1909 and again 
in 1913 in King’s Ravine. It is, therefore, highly appropriate that 
it bear the name of the keen and untiring explorer of the White Moun- 
tain flora, Arthur Stanley Pease, who shared in its discovery; and to 
those who are familiar with Dr. Pease’s well-earned reputation as an 
alpine explorer there is a singular propriety in dedicating to him a 
plant which, like him, finds itself at home on the almost inaccessible 
wet cliffs of a mountain ravine. 
The new species is proposed as 
