BOT> 

 GARDt ' 



BULLETIN 



OF THE 



TORREY BOTANICAL CLUB 



Vol. XVII.] New York, July 1, 1890. [No. 7. 



X 



The Revised Manual and Some Western Plants. 



fV 



/r By E. J. Hill. 



In giving the geographical range of plants as briefly as a 

 handbook requires, liabilities to err by trying to say much in a 

 word or short phrase must be recognized. That all sources of 

 information are not equally and carefully examined may also be 

 true, and as a consequence omissions may occur and due credit 

 fail to be given. The literature of local botany has become quite 

 extensive ; all of it is not very accessible and some likely to be 

 overlooked. 'The details of geographical distribution even in a 

 part of a large country is a subject requiring great patience in re- 

 search and special aptitude for its pursuit Some of these omis- 

 sions or lapses from the ideal had been noticed in the Revised 

 Manual. One naturally turns first to those things which are 

 familiar to him in his own field, or to which he may have called 

 attention somewhere, and so the error is easily detected. Prof. 

 Porter has mentioned some in the BULLETIN for March. It is 

 'evident that the botany of the future can best be made complete 

 by the co-operation of all who are interested, and who may have 

 special knowledge of particular fields which they are willing to 

 communicate, and place within easy reach of those who prepare 

 our manuals. But first I will notice a few errors in Prof Porter's 

 article, if I understand the purport of his restrictions and inquiries. 



One plant he mentions is Poly gala polyga7nay Walt, said in 

 the Manual to be ''common." To this the remark is added, ''A 

 plant of the eastern seaboard and rare in northern New Jersey, 

 not known in Pennsylvania." Perhaps this does not mean that 

 the plant is confined to the seaboard, but that would be the in- 

 ference. The older Manual said: ''Dry, sandy soil; cammon 

 eastward," not necessarily confining it to the East, but making it 



