SHORT ARTICLES. 175 



Like Finus Torreyana, Abies bracteaid is restricted iu range 

 to one small area, the Santa Lucia mountains of California 

 being the only known locality for the species. It occurs at 

 an altitude of 3,000 to 6,000 feet. — Alice Eastwood. 



Centaurea Calcitrapa, L.: — This species is found 

 throughout almost the whole of Europe, in parts of Asia 

 Minor and on Islands of the Mediterranean. In the Syn- 

 optical Flora it is recorded as " sparingly established at 

 seaports from New York southward, chiefly as a mere ballast 

 weed:" it has appeared also in California, Mr. Jepsou hav- 

 ing collected specimens at Vacaville, Solano county, in 

 August, 1887. Recently I collected it in San Mateo county, 

 not far from San Mateo, on the road to Crystal Springs lake: 

 at present there are but two or three plants, but it is likely 

 to spread, as C. Melitensis and C. solsUtialis have done. 

 The plant is about 2 feet high, diffusely branched, and form- 

 ing bunches. The flowers are rose colored, the involucral 

 bracts being armed with long, spreading, rigid, yellow spines. 

 The leaves are sessile, pinnatifid, not decurrent as are those 

 of C. solsiUialis and C. Melitensis. — Alice Eastwood. 



Recent introductions into California :-P/«/ysaZi8 Phil- 

 adclphica, Lam. Miss Eastwood informs me that sev- 

 eral plants of this species occur on the road between 

 Piedmont and Moraga Pass, in Alameda county. It is 

 evidently an " alien, " escaped from some garden where 

 the plant has been cultivated for the sake of its edible 

 fruits. 



The term alien as here used is borrowed from Hewett 

 Cottrell Watson's celebrated Topographical Botany of the 

 British Islands. In this work the author classifies the doubt- 

 fully indigenous species as " aliens, " "" colonists, '' and 

 "denizens. " He defines these terms as follows: 



" A denizen is a species suspected to have been introduced 

 by man, and which maintains its habitat. A colonist is one 

 found only in ground adapted by man for its growth and 



