254 Rhodora [NOVEMBER 
THE BOREAL AND SUBALPINE VARIETY OF SPIRAEA 
LATIFOLIA. 
M. L. FERNALD. 
Spiraea latifolia (Ait.) Borkh., as it occurs through most of its range, 
has the leading or primary inflorescence pyramidal-paniculate, the 
lower branches of the panicle being distinctly elongate. Its secondary 
inflorescences are less pyramidal in outline and are often subcylindric 
or ellipsoid; but all well-developed or uninjured specimens show the 
characteristic pyramidal terminal or primary panicle. 
In Newfoundland and eastern Saguenay County, Quebec, however, 
S. latifolia departs from the more widely distributed shrub with 
pyramidal primary panicles in having all the panicles of a cylindric 
or subcylindric form, the lower branches of the inflorescence scarcely 
if at all exceeding the subtending leafy bracts; and the only collection 
from the Magdalen Islands, although somewhat transitional, is nearer 
the Newfoundland shrub than to the widely distributed shrub of the 
mainland. 
In 1915, while collecting on the Franconia Range of the White 
Mountains the writer was impressed by the similarity of the subalpine 
form of Spiraea latifolia to the shrub of Newfoundland, and during 
the past summer, while exploring Huntington’s Ravine and the Alpine 
Garden of Mt. Washington with Professors A. W. Evans and A. S. 
Pease, he was again struck with the strong resemblance of the sub- 
alpine and alpine shrub with the Newfoundland plant and its pro- 
nounced departure from the lowland S. latifolia. 
Examination of all the material in the Gray Herbarium and the 
herbarium of the New England Botanical Club shows these field- 
impressions to have been well founded; for the alpine and subalpine 
specimens, from Mt. Katahdin, Maine, and the Carter, Presidential 
and Franconia Ranges of New Hampshire, agree with the Newfound- 
land specimens in their cylindric or subcylindriec primary panicles. 
On many of the specimens, from all three areas, the flowers are some- 
what larger than in much of the pyramidal-panicled shrub of lower 
latitudes or altitudes, but some specimens from low altitudes in New 
England show quite as large flowers. As geographic varieties, differ- 
ing primarily in the form of the primary panicle, the two are well 
