Vol. XIII, pp. 195-198 December 21, 1900 



PROCEEDINGS 



OF THE 



BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON 



RIBES MESCALERIITM, AN UNDESCRIBED CURRANT 

 FROM NEW MEXICO AND TEXAS. 



BY FREDERICK V. COVILLE. 



Dr. Valery Havard, in his report on the Flora of Western 

 and Southern Texas, identified one of his plants as Hibes vis- 

 cosissrmiim Pursh, and wrote of it as "the only gooseberry 

 seen in western Texas, growing- sparingly in the Guadalupe 

 Mountains."* On the basis of the same observations Dr. John 

 M. Coulter included iiiscosissimttm in his Botany of Western 

 Texas, commenting on it as occurring "sparingly in the moun- 

 tains west of the Pecos, and apparently the only gooseberry of 

 western Texas. "f Dr. Havard's specimen, which is in the 

 National Herbarium, was collected in the Guadalupe Mountains, 

 El Paso County, Texas, in October, 1881. It has neither flo'w- 

 ers nor fruit, and has long been a puzzle on account of its pe- 

 culiar vegetative characters, intermediate between those of vis- 

 ''osissiniifm and cereum. In Professor Coulter's description the 

 rtower and fruit characters were of course drawn from Rocky 

 Mountain specimens of typical viscosissimttm, so that the Texas 

 plant has really never been described, nor does any good material 

 of it seem to have been collected. 



*Havard, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus. 8 : 524. 188.5. 

 fContr. U. 8. Xat. Herb. 2 :109. 1891. 



41— Biol. Soc. Wash. Vol. XIII, 1900. m^) 



