Kfs BOTANICAL GAZETTE. 



and at length directly frem Mr. M. E. Hyams, of Statesville, North Caroli- 

 na, a flowering specimen of the long-sought Shortia galacifolia. Hr. Hy- 

 ams, or more strictly his son, George McQueen Hyams, collected it on a 

 hill-side in McDowell County, N. C, in the district I had indicated as the 

 most probable locality, viz: east of the Black Mountain. It was collected 

 in May, 1877, but as its remarkable interest was unknown, it has only now 

 been communicated to me. I will only state here, that the distinction be- 

 tween the twj genera is probably definite, that our plant is perhaps identi- 

 cal in species with the one figured in the Japanese books (rather than with 

 S. unifiom), although the corolla in ours is seemingly white, and the cren- 

 ulation ot the border of the lobes is stronger than that in the description 

 and often double; that the anther, though not agreeing with Maximo wicz's 

 character, probably may agree with this Japanese representative, and may 

 be generically distinguished from that of Schizocodon. unless other species 

 aiford transitions; and that the squamulse are like those of Schizocodon and 

 fully as lai-ge, but broader, narrowed or almost uiiguiculate at base, and 

 attached to the very base of the corolla, while the filaments (said by Max- 

 imowicz to be "libera" probably in the sense of free from the corolla, as 

 they are represented in the Japanese figure) are aduate to the corolla for 

 most of their length. That is, the phrase ''filameutis tubo corollge adnatis" 

 in Benth. and Hook. Gen. PI. is correct, but I know no then extant author- 

 ity for it, except the analogy with its relatives. Less fortunate are the char- 

 acters: ''Antherffi erectse. didymge . . . loculis oblique dehiscentibus," de- 

 rived by Maximowicz from the Japanese figures, and the "antherte breves j 

 . . . loculis divergentibus" of the Genera Plantarum; the anthers beini^ I 

 larger than in any other genus of the order, and the cells in a just sense 1 

 longitudinally dehiscent. But the anther is — as in all its relatives except 

 the anoaialous Galax — inflexed or incumbent on the apex of the filament in 

 this genus about horizontal, as are consequently the marginal sutures which 

 run the whole length of the elongated-oblong cells. The pollen is simple 

 and obscurely trigonous as seen on the field of the microscope. The style 



and stigma are as in Schizocodon, but the latter more capitate. A G in 



Am. Jour, for December. 



Plantago Rugelii.— In a letter from Dr. J. J. Davis, of Racine, Wis- 

 consin, the following is of general interest: 'T find that people who' are in 

 the habit of indulging in plantain "greens" have long known that there 

 were two kinds; the one P. Rngelii, toothsome; the other, P. major, bitter 



