115 



no. Portulaca Oleracea, L. — Is common purslane cleistoga- 

 mous ? Picking up a piece of purslane, while waiting for*a train, I 

 'was struck by the fact that none of the many flowers on it seemed 

 ever to have opened. Most of them were distinctly marked with the 

 line of future dehiscence, and contained well formed ovules, the more 

 advanced ones already turning brown. In the smallest flowers ex- 

 amined the ovules had assumed form, but the anthers had not yet 

 discharged their pollen. In those a little larger this discharge had 

 taken place, while in those still more advanced the deliquescent 

 flower was entirely enclosed. In all of them the outer sepal embraced 

 the inner, surmounting it with its pointed crest, and showing no signs 

 of their ever having been parted for the displ ayof the flower. 



Considering how many competent observers have studied this 

 plant, none of whom, I believe, has noticed its cleistogamy, and how 

 little opportunity I have had for watching its flowering, it is with dif- 

 fidence that I raise the question, and would be glad to have my 

 notion confirmed or disproved. 



In Le Maout and Decaisne,French edition, p. 442, are figures better 

 illustrative of this point than Sprague's in Gray's Genera, particularly 

 a section of an unopened flower. The aril-like expansion of the end 

 of the funiculus does not appear in Le Maout and Decaisne's illustra- 

 tion, and is hardly adequately represented in Gray, Tab. 99, Figs. 8 



and 9. 



Sept. 17, r88i. 



W. H, L. (^ 



III. 



Notes from Chemung County, New York. — I had the 



good fortune to find on the fourth of July, 188 r, good flowering 

 plants of Liparis Loeselii^ Richard. It was growing in patches on 

 the moist ledges of the Wellesburg Narrows, amongst moss. This is 

 the only locality for it known to me in this part of the State. In 

 1S74 I found one specimen of Cacalia atripUcifoUa, L., at the side of 

 the railroad at Wellesburg, but have never seen another since. May 

 the seed have been dropped from a passing train ? I also found one 



n 



efolius 



stiperbum^ L., also grows sparingly along the Chemung, and in 1874 I 

 found there one specimen of Cassia Marilandica^ L. 



I will exchange for rare plants from other parts of New York, 

 and desire to correspond with working botanists in all parts of the 

 State. 



Lowman, N. Y. T. F. Lucy, M.D. 



112. Notes on Polygalaand Lechea. — In August, while ram- 

 bling about Cotuit Port, on the south shore of Cape Cod, I picked 

 up a piece of Folygala Senega, L., in an open woods ; there did not 

 seem to be much of it just in that spot, and my companion, not being 

 a botanist, did not leave me time to search for it at my. leisure, espe- 

 cially as I had forgotten that this is further east than it has been re- 

 ported. Not a great ways off, Genista tincioria, L., was found grow- 

 ing thriftily in several patches. 



Lechea maritima, nobis, Z. fhymifolia. Gray, not Pursh, abounds 



