91 



broth 



er. 



Dr. Masters mentions cases of double spathes in An/ni 



niaculatum, but I have seen no record of multiplication of the spa- 

 dices in that or any related plant. 



W. W. Bailey. 



Adhesion between two Beeches.— in the case represented in 

 the annexed cut, reproduced from a drawing sent to the Bulletin 

 by Mr. Arthur Hollick, Nature appears to have executed a species 

 of grafting, akin to that which, in the operations of gardening, is 



known as *' inarching." The figure represents 

 two small trees of Fagus ferruginea^ A\X,y the 

 axes of which, through very close contact, at 

 about five feet above the surface of the soil, have 

 adhered at that point until a perfect union has 

 taken place and the two individuals have become 

 inseparably blended together there into one trunk. 

 The fusion once effected, all traces of the union 

 have become thoroughly effaced through subse- 

 quent annual growth. As will be observed, adhe- 

 sion has also occurred at the bases of the trees. 

 Examples of this nature are perhaps not 

 quite as frequent as the occasionally figured 

 ones where two contiguous trees of the same 

 species have become united through the cohe- 

 sion of their branches, the axes preserving their 

 individuality above such point of union. 



Those who have taken the trip by stage- 

 coach, from the steamboat landing at the foot 

 of Lake George to Fort Ticonderoga, have per- 

 haps had pointed out to them by the driver at a 

 certain point on the route, an instance oi a 

 still more singular sort of adhesion, where two 

 trees of different genera — an oak and an elm — are so closely and 

 firmly adherent for about three feet above the ground-line as to form 

 but a single trunk, which is apparently covered by a continuous 

 bark. 



The specimen here brought to the reader's attention by Mr. 

 Hollick was detected by Mr. G. M. Wilber, near Pleasant Plains, 

 Staten Island, on the occasion of a field meeting of the Torrey 

 Club ; and, after having been hewn down by the only implements 

 available — pocket knives and a geological hammer — was transported 

 with some difficulty to the museum of the Staten Island Natural 

 History Society. 



' Fern Notes. — Permit me to add to Mr, Davenport's Fern Notes, 

 page 71, May number of the Bulletin, that Botrychium nudicaule, 

 L. f., is quite common from Temecula Canon (north of San Diego) 

 to All Saints* Bay in Lower California. I have gathered many spec- 

 imens of it in various places. It grows on dry ground, usually 

 wherever Dodccatheon or Selaginella does. The plant is very incon- 

 spicuous, and usually springs up and vanishes in less than six weeks. 



