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IIl.— Eleocharis mutata (L.) R. & S. 
This plant was detected during the present seasonin Wolf Lake, 
along the eastern border of Chicago, and near the boundry line 
of Indiana. It grew in abundance but had hitherto escaped the 
notice of collectors in this vicinity, as I find no allusions to it in 
this locality. An examination of its. flowers showed that they 
were proterogynous, the protruding style and stigmas being brown 
and withered while the stamens are still covered by the scales. A 
further study of the plants showed that the styles appear above 
the scales just after the spikes have risen out of the water from 
one to three or four inches. When the plants have stretched 
upward from six to twelve inches beyond their proterogynous 
stage, the anthers make their appearance above the scales. The 
spikes are about an inch in length at first, but increase in length 
and diameter as they become older, or reach their second stage. 
Then the anthers burst, and freely scatter the dry pollen about, 
some of which will lodge on the feathery stigmas. The plant is 
fertilized by the wind, or even by simple gravity, since the stems 
are near together, several rising from the same rhizome. The ele- 
vation of the spikes when the stamens appear, bringing them above 
the younger flowers in which the stigmas are ready to receive the 
pollen, facilitates its reaching them at a level so much below, since 
it may simply drop upon them. But the wind, either directly or 
by agitating the water and shaking the stems, must be regarded 
as the principal agent in the cross-fertilization of the flowers. 
The inflorescence of the spikes is centrifugal, the older stamens 
being mostly above. Belated stamens sometimes appear without 
anthers. They rise above the scales as pale elongations of fila- 
ments, a little enlarged at the top. 
ENGLEWoop, CHICAGO. 
Variations in the Rootstock of Smilax glauca dependent upon 
Environment. 
On the south beach of Staten Island, at the line of high water, 
there are often a number of hard, gall-like bodies, lying on the 
sand. These are sea-worn parts, often single tubers, from the 
rootstock of the cat-brier, probably in every case from Smilax 
glauca. This species grows on the bluffs that are constantly — 
