612 Rydberg : The American Species of 



place of publication of P. Ghicsbrechtiana Rich, et Gal., he has Ann. 

 Sc. Nat. (1845) I. 30, when it should have been III. 3: 30. 

 Haboiai'ia flagcUaris S. Wats, has never been published. 



A work with such numerous and glaring mistakes reflects little 

 credit to the author, and how can it be trusted ? He has given the 

 following remarks under his Platantlicra Jiypei'borea : " Es is ein 

 ganzlisch fruchtloses Bemiihen, die unzahligen Formen dieser weit- 

 verbeiteten Art unter Diagnosen von besonderen Species zu fix- 

 ieren. Je tiefer man in die Formenreihe eindringt, desto mehr 

 verschwimmen die bei der Betrachtung einzelner fiir constant gehal- 

 tenen Merkmale. Durch die Liberalitat amerikanischer Institute 

 und Botaniker verfiigen die europaischen Sammlungen iiber ein 

 reiches Material, welches die kritische Beurteilung sehr wohl ermog- 

 licht. Alle bisher beschriebenen 'Arten' stellen ihre Berechti- 

 gung auf rein habituelle Merkmale, was bei Orchideen stricte zu 

 verwerfen ist." 



It is evident that notwithstanding the statement given above the 

 author has not tried very hard to bring the different forms under dis- 

 tinct diagnoses and he has not penetrated very deep into the series 

 of forms when he did not find the broad thin connective of Habc- 

 naria sparsiflora and H. breviflora ; perhaps he had seen neither. 

 It is strange if the herbaria of continental Europe should be rich 

 in North American orchids when our own are far from rich and 

 the representation at Kew is very meager. And still if the author 

 had examined the American material when at Kew, he would have 

 been able to correct some of his mistakes. None of the species 

 so far as I know have been merely based on characters in habit, 

 for in all, the spur, the lip, and the stamen have been described 

 more or less completely, and these are the only organs that give 

 any reliable characters. The habit is mostly the same in all and 

 can be used as a diagnostic character only in a few cases. 



In discussing H. brevifolia Greene, the author remarks : " Der 

 Samler und Autor der Pflanze vergleicht sie mit Platantliera oder 

 nach seiner Schreibart Habenaria sparsiflora Wats. Der Vergleich 

 is nicht glijcklisch, denn PL sparsflora ist eine noch dazu wenig 

 charakteristische Form von hyperborea.'" Prof. Greene's comparison 

 of H. brevifolia with H. sparsiflora was the only logical one, for the 

 latter was the only known species with the flower-structure of H. 

 brevifolia, although this has much larger flowers. 



