NORTH AMERICAN MAPLES. 91 



by Pursh, which they pronounce Acer rubrum. Nuttall 

 on their authority, as he states, goes so far as to declare 

 barbatum u a nonentity, as it [or Pursh's conception of it] 

 is founded upon the flowers of the sugar maple, the fruit 

 of the red maple, and a leaf (probably) of the Acer spica- 

 tum." It may be added that the name barbatum was orig- 

 inally applied because of the bearding within the flowers, 

 and not with reference to any pubescence of the lower sur- 

 face of the leaves. As between the two names saccharum 

 and barbatum, I should, therefore, choose the former as 

 more certainly applying to the sugar maple, and because of 

 its prior publication, and this conclusion has been reached 

 also by Britton,f Hitchcock, J and Sudworth.§ If the 

 identification of Borckhausen's Acer palmifolium is cor- 

 rect, this name in point of priority stands between sac- 

 charum and barbatum. It seems, however, to refer to 

 the more typical form of the species, denoted by the former 

 name, so that it does not invalidate the use which I shall 

 propose to make of saccharum for the type, and of bar- 

 batum for a fairly characterized variety of the sugar maple 

 to which the original description of barbatum applies more 

 closely than to any other. 



As the result of a careful examination of the available 

 material, I am disposed to recognize three species of the 

 group Saccharina, two of them represented by fairly 

 marked varieties in addition to the typical form, — namely, 

 A. saccharum, with its varieties barbatum and nigrum, A. 

 Floridanum, with its variety acuminatum, and A. grandi- 



dentatum, the last named certainly aberrant. 



Acer saccharum and its variety nigrum do not appear to 



* Sylva, ii. 88. 

 • f Cat, Plants of New Jersey, 78, 



X Trans. St. Louis Acad., v. 490. 



§ Dept. Agriculture Report, 1892, 325. It may be of interest to note 

 that in a French translation of Marshall's book by L6zermes (1788), the 

 name is replaced by saccharinum, apparently because of the translator's 

 feeling that the spelling of Marshall was the result of an error; a possi- 

 bility which Professor Sargent also has suggested. 



4 



