218 
Dr. Britton said that Scolopendrium is probably a case like that 
of Seguoia and Brasenia of originally much wider distribution, 
where the isolated plants owe their survival to favorable condi- 
tions, He cited Epzpactis among orchids as a parallel in distribu- 
tion, confined here to central New York and Ontario, but wide- 
spread in the old world. 
Mr. Benj. D. Gilbert added an interesting comparison of the 
growth of Scolopendrium at stations where he had collected it at 
Jamesville and Chittenango Falls, also in southern France, north- 
ern Italy, and Undercliff in the Isle of Wight. In the warm 
shelter of the latter place, it is more luxuriant than anywhere else, 
showing great tendency to sport, displaying forking tips and 
deeply cordate bases, as at Chittenango Falls. 
3. The third paper was by Mr. B. D. Gilbert, of Utica, N. Y., 
entitled, “ New and interesting Ferns from Bolivia,” with exhibi- 
tion of specimens of two new ferns, a Blechnum and a Dryopteris, 
the first peculiar in being fully pinnate, the second in being a one- 
sided dwarf persistently under a foot and a-half high, instead of 
4 or 5 feet as its type. The paper will be printed in the BULLETIN 
4. The fourth paper, also by Mr. Gilbert, Jamaica, the Fern- 
Lover’s Paradise,” described the abundance of species and of in- 
dividuals which the speaker had collected there, illustrating the a 
subject by numerous specimens. He remarked that Swartz in his 
Species Filicum, 1783-86, enumerating all then known ferns, de- 
scribed 709 species, of which 140 were from Jamaica; the Jamai- 
can number was raised to 300 by Grisebach and now to 500 by 
resident botanists there, an estimate confirmed by Mr. Gilbert. : 
Probably no other equal area produces half that number. — 
Among reasons which account for this are the warm latitude of 
Jamaica, its south shore sheltered from cooler breezes by a moun- 
tain-wall, its mountains themselves rising to 7,000 feet and reach- 
ing into a cool temperate climate, and its great variation in 
moisture, with daily rains in the mountains and sometimes but © 
twice in six months on the plain. Mr. Gilbert described in pat- — : 
ticular his experiences with the tree-ferns reached by a long jout- ee 
ney on foot, high in the Blue mountains, there forming unmixed 
groves, their stems supplying the only wood readily obtainable. 
One, Alsophila armata, reaches 50 feet in height, though its slen- 
