Ribes Aureum and Ribes Lentum. 27 



lacustre molle. Meanwhile Mr. Marcus E. Jones, in 1895, had 

 published* a Ribes lacustre lentum based on specimens collected 

 at an elevation of about 10,000 feet in the Henry Mountains 

 and on Belknap Peak, southern Utah. In publishing the variety 

 the author called attention to the possible identity of lentum 

 and molle, a point that could only be determined by an examina 

 tion of the type specimens of the latter. This has now been 

 done and shows the two to be the same. 



My attention was recently called by Professor C. V. Piper to 

 the fact that among the specimens referred by Gray to his 

 Ribes lacustre parvulum\ are some which belong in reality to 

 Ribes lacustre molle Gray, and the suggestion was therefore 

 made that the varietal name parvulum should be taken up as the 

 specific name of the plant under discussion. In his original 

 description Dr. Gray characterized his variety as with nearly 

 glabrous leaves, smaller than those of the type form of lacustre^ 

 as occurring in "the Rocky Mountains and north to British 

 Columbia," and as having been mistaken formerly for Ribes 

 setosum. An examination of the material in the Harvard Her 

 barium shows that Dr. Gray named as Ribes lacustre parvulum 

 six specimens which he had formerly determined as setosum, as 

 follows: 



"Rocky Mts. Hook. Dupl. Fl. Bor. Am. 1 R. oxyacan- 

 thoides.'" 



"Hort. Cantab. Anno 1846 (178 Loddiges)." 



"Isle St. Ignace, L. Superior." 



Hall & ^Harbour's No. 184 of their Rocky Mountain 

 Flora. 



Parry's No. 149 of his Rocky Mountain Flora. 



Watson's No. 376 of the King Survey, from the Uinta 

 Mountains, Utah. 



The first three of these are lacustre-like plants with smooth 

 and small leaves, while the last three are Ribes lentum. We 

 have therefore no definite fixation of the type in the original 

 specimens. Turning to the [customary treatment of parvulum 

 in herbaria and published papers, we find that botanists have 

 applied the name either to the small and smooth-leaved, black- 

 fruited plant so frequent in the northern Rocky Mountains, or, 



*Jones, Proc. Gal. Acad. II, 5:681. 1895. 

 fGray, Bot. Cal. 1: 206. 1876. 



