Vail : Studies in the Lec-.umixosae 111 



Herbier dc Vaillant." The writing on the label is supposed to be 

 that of either Sherard or of Ray, and interlined and blurred so 

 that a few of the words could only be guessed at. The " Herbier 

 dc Vaillant" contains many West Indian plants, among others 

 specimens from the Antillian collection figured by Plumier,* and 

 this specimen might have had some such provenance. In the Her- 

 barium of the British Museum a specimen of Triana's collection 

 in New Grenada also fairly well agrees with the Jacquin plate, as do 

 also the specimens collected by Dr. Palmer, no. 269, from the State 

 of Jalisco, Mexico, with, perhaps, the exception of the somewhat 

 smaller leaves; but the latter specimens certainly are not R. 

 phaseoloidcs, under which name they seem to have been distributed. 

 Another plant, exactly matching Palmer's, was collected by Fred. 

 Muller, no. 1768, in Mexico, in 1853. (Herb. Columbia Univ.) 

 It has the very hirsute legume which is so marked a characteristic 



of 'the figure of R. Caribaca. 



In Hemsley, Biologia Centr. Am. i: 310, the distribution of 

 R. Caribaca is given as South Mexico, near Tantoyuca (Erven- 

 berg, no. 35) and ''common in the West Indies and the northern 

 part of South America ; also in Tropical and South Africa." I 

 have not seen the Ervenberg specimen, nor have I seen any South 

 African specimens of R. gibba, which satisfied me as being iden- 

 tical with the plant figured by Jacquin. It proves a most interest- 

 ing species, and it is to be hoped that these very incomplete notes 

 will call the attention of collectors to it and possibly bring about 

 a better knowledge of it and of its geographical distribution. 



5 



. Dolicholus Americanus (Miller) 



Lathyrus Americana W\\\<^x,<^-c\x^r\.V>\QX. no. 19. 1768. 

 Rhynchosia mcnispermoidca DC. Mem. Leg. 364. 1823. 

 Phascolus mcnispermoidca Eat. & Wright, N. Am. Bot. 353. 



1840. 



Texas to South Mexico. 



■ *Plumier's Herbarium of West Indian plants is preserved in the Herbarium of the 

 Jardin des Plantcs at Paris, where it is easily accessible tu students. It consists of ten 

 folio volumes, the specimens glued on' the pages and numbered. They are in various 

 stages of preservation and are especially valuable as being the originals of the figures 

 in the Fasciculi Plantarum Americanum and of many Linnean types as well as the 

 " Herb. Surian" of De Candolle's Prodromus. 



