454 SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 



from the lignites of Brandon, Vermont, U.S.A. One hundred and 

 eighteen species are recorded, and many new forms of more or less 

 doubtful, affinities are described, including several new genera, such as 

 MonocarpeUites (11 species), Hicoroides (5 species), Bkarpellites (5 species), 

 Brandonia, Rubioides, Sapindokles (6 species) and Prunoides. 



Explorations in Georgia.* — Poland Harper gives an account of 

 his botanical work in the coast plain of Georgia in 1903. He studied 

 especially the Altamaha Grit, one of the most botanically interesting and 

 extensive geological formations in the State, covering an area of at least 

 11,000 square miles. It is a gently rolling region, nine-tenths of which 

 in its natural condition is pine-barrens, and the remainder mostly swamps, 

 which border the numerous streams and sand-hills which occur along 

 most of the creeks and rivers. The author gives notes on the more 

 interesting plants, including a bibliographical account of Carina flaccida, 

 a species confined to the south-eastern United States, about which there 

 has been some confusion, both as to name and geographical distribution. 



CBYPTOGAMS. 



Pteridophyta. 



(By A. Gepp, M.A., F.L.S.) 



Index Filicum.t — C. Christensen publishes the first fascicle of an 

 index to all the genera and species of ferns and fern-allies described 

 between 1753 and l'J05, with their synonyms and geographical dis- 

 tribution. The manuscript is all ready for printing, and will make a 

 book of about 750 pages, in 11 or 12 parts, issued in quick succession. 

 The author has been engaged upon the preparation of the Index for 

 many years, and has taken every precaution to ensure the accuracy of 

 his citations and dates. The work is divided into three sections : I. a 

 systematic enumeration of the genera based on the arrangement 

 elaborated in Engler and Prantl's " Die Natiirlichen Pflanzenfamilien." 

 II. An alphabetical enumeration of the species and synonyms published 

 between 1753 and 1005, including garden names. III. An alphabetical 

 catalogue of literature, wherein new genera and species are described or 

 examined. 



Affinities of Ophioglossacese and MarsiliacesB.I — D. H. Campbell 

 discusses in detail F. O. Bower's view that the whole spike of Ophio- 

 fflossum. is the equivalent of a single sporangium of Lycopodium, and 

 that all the pteridophytes are reducible to a common strobiloid type, as 

 seen in the Lycopods or Equisetaceae. Campbell, on the contrary, holds 

 to his own published view that the direct origin of the Ophioglossacese 

 was from an Anthoceros-like prototype, the hypothetical ancestral form 

 being almost realised in Ophioglossum simplex, with its long stalked 

 sporangiophore, and scarcely traceable sterile segment. Further, he 

 traces in detail the close relationship between the Ophioglossacese and 



* Bull. Torrey Bot. Club., xxxii. (1905) pp. 141-71 (5 figs.). 

 t Copenhagen : Hagerup, 1905, Fasc. i., pp. 1-64. 

 % Amer. Nat., xxxviii. (1904) pp. 761-75. 



