Howe: Phycological studies 567 



the present time about thirty localities, can be arranged, though 

 rather unsatisfactorily, in two groups, which for the present we are 

 designating as Avrainvillea nigricans Decaisne and A. Mazei Mur- 

 ray & Boodle. Avrainvillea longicaulis, as described and figured 

 by Murray and Boodle,* we are convinced cannot be considered 

 specifically different from A. nigricans, as represented by the 

 probable type of the latter species preserved in the herbarium of 

 the Museum d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris. 



The type of Avrainvillea nigricans Decaisne is referred to in 

 the following words in the place of original description : f "In 

 Antillis (iles des Saintes prope la Guadeloupe). — CI. d'Avrainville. 

 (v. in Herb. Mus. Paris.)." In the herbarium of the Paris museum, 

 there is at the present time no specimen of d'Avrainville's collect- 

 ing bearing the name Avrainvillea nigricans, but there is a single 

 specimen associated with a label inscribed in Decaisne's hand : 

 " Avrainvillea nigra Dne. Iles des Saintes pres la Guadeloupe. 

 M. D'Avrainville. 1842," and as this agrees with the description 

 published under the specific name nigricans, there can be no rea- 

 sonable doubt that it is the true type of the species in question. 

 This specimen has a single somewhat worn and broken flabellum 

 supported by a stipe a trifle more than 1 cm. long springing from 

 a subcylindrical rhizome 3.5 cm. long, which is continued beyond 

 into what may have been the stipe of another flabellum ; the fla- 

 bellum proper has a length of 3.3 cm. and its original width was 

 probably about the same ; the filaments of the flabellum are moni- 

 liform, as originally described, and have a diameter of 44-55//. 

 We can discover nothing beyond its smaller size to distinguish it 

 from the A. longicaulis of Murray and Boodle. The original 

 Rhipilia longicaulis of Kutzing % "Ad Antillas (Herb. Sonder) " 

 has not been found in the Kutzing herbarium now owned by 

 Madame Weber-van Bosse, and an inquiry in regard to it has been 

 addressed to Melbourne, Australia, where the Sonder herbarium, 

 cited by Kutzing, is supposed to be.§ The plant needs further 

 study. We have never seen filaments from a flabellum ending in 

 slender hyaline hairs like those figured and described by Kutzing. 



* Jour. Bot 27 : 70. pi. 288. f. 1-5. 1889. 

 fAnn. Sci. Nat. II. 18: 108. 1842. 

 ■\ Kiitz. Tab. Phyc. 8 : 13. pi. 28./. 2. 1S58. 

 \ See " Addendum" on page 586. 



