r 



51 



has been the experience of the British Club that manuscript 

 lists of desiderata should not be received. 



(5.) Each species should be represented by a number of 

 specimens to be determined when the probable number of mem- 

 bers shall be ascertained. It is not necessary to emphasize at 

 this time the necessity for complete and satisfactory specimens 

 being furnished, with appropriate labels. 



The British Club had in 1886 a membership of fifty-eight, 

 and has been in successful operation for a number of years. It 

 would seem certain that at least an equal number of American 

 botanists would consider it advantageous to join a similar 

 organization. 



Suggestions regarding the matter here presented and appli- 

 cations for membership should be sent to the chairman of the 

 Committee, Dr. George Vasey, U. S. Department of Agricul- 

 ture, Washington, D. C. The Committee. 



Castalia versus Nymphaea. 



It may be of interest to those concerned in the discussion of 

 Nymphcea and Nuphar, brought up in the pages of the BULLETIN, 

 to know that Sir James Edward Smith, in his " Introduction to 

 Physiological and Systematic Botany," published in 1807, refers 

 as follows (p. 385) to Castalia: "I believe Mr. Salisbury's Cas- 

 talia x^yN^W separated from Nvmphcea, se^^ Annals of Botany, v. 

 2,71." It would appear from this that, whatever Smith may 

 have done the year following, in 1807 he accepted Castalia and 

 credited Salisbury with it JOSEPH F. James. 



J 



Notes on Smilax pumila, Walt. 



The division of Qnercus into two sections, one annual- fruited 

 and the other biennial-fruited, is familiar to botanists, but it is 

 not so well known that the genus Smilax might be similarly divided. 

 Most of our Atlantic coast species flower in spring or early sum- 

 mer and ripen fruit the same year. S. laiirifolia, L., flowers in 

 July and Aucjust, and Chapman notes (Fl., p. 47^) that its berries 

 mature "in the fall of the succeeding year." S. pumila, Walt, 

 does not bloom till October, but neither Chapman nor Wood 

 "mentions the time its berries ripen, nor does Walter in his origi- 



