346 MTSCELLAXEA. 



of the t\\'eiity-three females laid fertile eggs, though M. Jourdan 

 is convinced that neither in this experiment nor in the former one 

 can any impregnation have taken place. The good eggs were in 

 the proportion of one to seventeen. M. Jourdan does not mention 

 the sex of the young thus produced ; he promises, however, to repeat 

 his experiments on a larger scale. I. L. 



Botanical Information. — Fruiting specimens have been received 

 by Sir W. J. Hooker, of a very remarkable plant, growing in the 

 Dammar country, "West Africa, evidently closely allied to the genus 

 jPM?nio«, alluded to by Dr. Wei wilsch (Linn. Proe. Bot. v. 185), though 

 probably specifically distinct from his plant. A coloured sketch by 

 its discoverer Mr. Baines was forwarded with the specimens. The 

 plant is represented as destitute of the curious tubular stem described 

 by Welwilsch, but the huge riband- like spreading leaves, several feet 

 in length, and the character of the infrutescence corresjjond very 

 well with his account. Instead, however, of a single pair of leaves, 

 Mr. Baines represents the plant as possessing at least two pairs 

 crossing each other at right angles. The female flowers are ar- 

 ranged in lanceolate, closely-imbricating, squarrose cymes, 2 — 3 

 inches in length. Dr. Hooker, who is describing the specimens, 

 considers the Tmnhoa to be undoubtedly Gnetaceous. The structure 

 of the young fruits agrees very closely with that observed in Gnetum 

 itself. 



Common Ling i^Callema vulgaris) in Massachusetts. 



That "America has no heaths " is a botanical aphorism. It is un- 

 derstood, however, that an English surveyor, nearly 30 years ago, 

 found Callema vulr/aris in the interior of Newfoundland. Also that 

 De la Pylaie, still earlier, enumerates it as an inhabitant of that 

 island. But this summer, Mr. Jackson Dawson, a young gardener, 

 has brought us specimens of Kving plants (both flowering stocks and 

 young seedlings) from Tewkesbury, Massachusetts, where the plant 

 occurs rather abundantly over about half an acre of rather boggy 

 ground, along with Andromeda cali/culata, Azalea viscosa, Kalmia 

 angustifolia, Guatiola aurea, &c., ajiparently as much at home as 

 any of them. * * * * It may have been introduced, unlikely as it 

 seems, or we may have to range this heath with Scotopendrium offi- 

 cinarum, Saliularia aquatica, and Marsilea quadrifoUa, as species of 

 the old world so sparingly represented in the new, that they are 

 known only at single stations, — perhaps late-lingerers rather than 

 new comers. Asa Gray, in Silliman's Jour, xxxii. (1861.) 290. We 

 have seen a specimen of the Americaii Callema, forwarded to Dr. 

 Hooker. It does not seem to dift'cr in the least from the common 

 Ling of our moorlands. 



