102 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN. 
to glean from a study of them, and it is with a view to add 
these to the general knowledge of Lemnaceae that I append 
the following notes. 
WOLFFIA GLADIATA FLORIDANA, J. D. Smith. 
During the past summer the Garden received from the 
collector, Mr. B. F. Bush, a small package of aquatic plants, 
mostly of the order Lemnaceae, collected in the swampy 
region of southeastern Missouri. These plants reached 
the Garden in good healthy condition and were immedi- 
ately placed in a tank where they continued to thrive,— 
affording no little interest to many visitors. 
Later it was thought advisable to separate the species 
into different vessels, and in doing this my attention was 
attracted to a number of little clusters of minute ribbon- 
like green bodies floating about free just beneath the sur- 
face of the water, which at first glance might easily have 
been mistaken for algae, but, when examined under the 
microscope, revealed a much higher type of organized 
tissue. As no fruiting bodies could be detected, some diffi- 
culty was experienced in determining in just what part of 
the vegetable kingdom these little organisms belonged, but 
at length they were identified with Wolfia gladiata Flori- 
dana, J. D.S.,* of the order Lemnaceae. 
The typical Wolfia gladiata, Hegelm.f is a native of 
Mexico, at present reported only from the City of 
Mexico, where it grows abundantly in pools and ditches 
with kindred aquatics. 
Our variety Floridana differs from the specific form in 
proportionally longer and narrower fronds, which are curved 
moretosaber-form. Hegelmaier, the author of the species, 
in a letter to Capt. John Donnell Smith says, in comparing 
them: ‘* Had both forms come to my knowledge at the 
* Bull. Torr. Bot. Club, vir. 64 (1880). 
+ Hegelmaier: Die Lemnaceen, p. 133 (1868). 
