the New England Agrimonies 105 



* 



final pronouncement on this point. It must be kept in mind that 

 we are here dealing with a group of very critical species, and that 

 those of our own country, absolutely distinct as they are, were, 

 within a few years, although common and well-represented in her- 

 baria, hopelessly confused and mostly thrown together under one 



■ 



name. Although I have given much attention to our species, I 

 should hesitate to announce any capital conclusions as to identities 

 founded on anything less than a most careful comparative study of 

 complete material. The specimens of A. pilosa Ledeb. that I have 

 myself examined, though few in number, were all from European 

 herbaria and presumably authentic. These examples, apparently, 

 indeed, representing more than a single species, were of plants 

 certainly closely allied to A. Brittoniana, but which I could not 

 regard as identical. Nor can the figure of A. pilosa Ledeb. in 

 Reichb. Icon. 3 : pi. 252, which is cited by Wallroth, be corre- 

 lated with our American plant. 



A most interesting tendency of the more critical study of our 

 plants has been to effect a gradual elimination of European forms 

 °nce admitted to our flora, and it is certainly still in need of 

 demonstration that a common American agrimony, not of alpine 

 distribution, ranging from Quebec and New England somewhat 

 southward along the Alleghanies and west to the Rocky Moun- 

 tains, thence south into Arizona and New Mexico, is identical with 



I 



a central European species. 



The brief allusion to A. pilosa in my paper has been quite mis- 

 understood by Dr. Robinson. Nothing was attempted in the way 

 °f "disposal" of the species, only a mere reference to the confu- 

 sion regarding it in the treatments of different European botanists. 

 Wallroth placed it as a variety under A. Dahurica, an earlier name. 



As to the application of the name A. striata Michx., here is a 

 c ase where doctors disagree. Dr. Gray many years ago having 



Michaux, as is expressly attested by him, 



partrifi\ 



re- 



amined, this latter being precisely the plant described by me under 

 M'chaux's name. Now, Dr. Robinson, having examined a speci- 

 men of Michaux in the Jardin des Plantes, declares it to be the 

 s j*me as my A. Brittoniana. It is hard to solve this puzzle unless 

 the >"e be in existence, or was in Dr. Gray's time, more than one 



