1898-1902. No. 16.1 FLOW. PLANTS AND FERNS OF N.-W. GREENLAND. 39 



All these plants are tolerably common and widely-spread in the 

 northern parts of America; in Greenland, they are in general princi- 

 pally distributed in the northernmost parts, that is to say, where the di- 

 stance to the american area of the species is shortest. All of them, 

 moreover, have a more or less discontinuous distribution, the inter- 

 vening gap beginning either east of Greenland, or east of Spitsbergen- 

 Novaja Semlja. If we are to reckon these plants among the american 

 immigrants, we must presume that those which inhabit, for instance, 

 Spitsbergen also, have reached there in the same way as the species of 

 Group II, 1 have come to N. E. Greenland, most probably along a for- 

 mer land-bridge. I will not now, however, give them any definite place, 

 but will reckon them alternatively to Group U, or Group A. 



Now we have only 2 species from Gr. I, 1, left to discuss. Tarax- 

 acum phymatocarpum is only known from the northern parts of both 

 Greenland coasts and from a single locality in Ellesmereland. It may 

 be a Greenland plant and have reached Ellesmereland from there; but, 

 as its Ellesmereland locality is in a region where the american feature 

 is rather pronounced, it will more probably be found to have a wider 

 distribution in Arctic America. It can be counted either in Group A. 

 or in a Group G, containing Greenland plants, or also in the Group D, 

 species of dubious distribution. Diapensia lapponica has so curiously 

 interrupted a distribution, that one can hardly place it anywhere but in 

 Group D, even if it has probably reached N. W. Greenland, and per- 

 haps Ellesmei eland, from Danish Greenland where it is common. 



The 5 species forming Group II, 1, are doubtless all immigrants 

 from the east, as they are all found in Spitsbergen, mostly showing 

 also a wider distribution in Europe and Asia. In Greenland, they are 

 restricted to the northern parts of the east coast. Among them, Tar- 

 axacum arcticum, Gentiana tenella, and Ranunculus glacialis are 

 entirely missing in America, whereas Polemonium humile and Dryas 

 octopetala are found there, even though there is so wide an expanse 

 between their Ameircan and Greenland areas, as to make it impossible 

 to think of any connection between them. Those 5 species may form a 

 separate group E, to which also Saxifraga hieraciifolia (Gr. II, 2) may 

 be counted, as it shows a similar distribution, even if it is found in the 

 Arctic Archipelago also. 



The 4 species of Group II, 3, show rather a curious distribution. 

 Melandrium triflorum is one of the few endemic species of Greenland, 

 and must of course go to Group G, where I have alternatively placed 

 Taraxacum phymatocarpum. It is, however, reported also for Grin- 



