Bicknell: Studies in Sisvrixchium 239 



of Newfoundland, No. 129) to which species I had myself doubt- 

 fully referred it (Bull. Torr. Club, 26 : 339). 



A number of sheets of the distribution show the plant to be 

 mostly only 6-10 cm. high, and simple-stemmed with somewhat 



■ 



prolonged outer bract, thus closely simulating S. angustifoliam. 

 It is, however, clearly a much reduced northern or insular form 

 of vS. graminoides, drying dark as in that species, and showing the 

 weak and narrow proper stem and relatively broad thin rings with 

 closely serrulate edges, and also its thin-walled sub-globose cap- 

 sules or spreading pedicels. The leaves are also those of that 

 species, unmistakably so in a few stouter examples where they 

 become 4 mm. wide, although mostly not exceeding 1-1.5 mm. 



The tendency of this little plant to develop more clearly the 

 characters of >S. graminoides is shown by two examples collected 

 with the others which are three to four times taller and forked into 

 two slender branches. • These specimens show the extreme form 

 of attenuation seen in the mainland plant and are nearly matched 

 by the specimens from Sable Island, where Professor Macoun reports 

 the plant as common. It is there uniformly very slender, the 

 stems and leaves being but 1-2 mm. wide, and appears to have 



1 



unusually small capsules, unlike the Newfoundland plant on pedi- 

 eels scarcely spreading or exserted. It differs further from the lat- 

 ter in larger size (15— 30 cm. high) rather broader spathes with 

 less prolonged outer bract and in slenderly branched stem, only a 

 few examples having the stem simple. 



In Gaspe and Newfoundland, at the extreme northeastern limit 

 of its habitat, this, the widest-ranging of all our species except 5. 

 angustifoUinn, flowers from late in July till the end of August, 

 three to four months later than in the Gulf States, two to three 

 months later than in the South Atlantic States, except at high al- 

 titudes, and one to two months later than in the latitude of New 

 Jersey. In northern Michigan the species is equally late flower- 

 ing. In Ontario it appears to flower about the same time as in 

 central New York, and two or three weeks later than in southern 

 Michigan and New Jersey. 



The following specimens may be cited : 



Sable Island : July 22, 1899, in flower; Aug. 4, 1899, imma- 

 ture fruit. John Macoun. 



