398 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [BeC. 



DESCRIPTIONS OF THE CANADIAN SPECIES OF 

 MYOSOTIS, OR "FORGET-ME-NOT," WITH NOTES 

 ON OTHER PLANTS OF THE NATURAL ORDER 

 BORAGINACE^. 



By G. Lawson, Ph.D., LL.D., Profe.ssor of Chemistry and Mineralogy 

 in DalhoiLsie College and Uuiversity, Halifax, X. S. 



As the true relations of our palustral forms of Myosotis have 

 not liitherto been explained, it may be well to call the attention of 

 botanical students to the subject, by characterizing our plants 

 more carefully than has been done, and endeavouring to adjust 

 the nomenclature, I shall add a few notes on the other Buragi- 

 nacece, found within the Dominion or adjoining country, with the 

 view of promoting enquiry in regard to doubtful points of identity 

 and distribution. 



All the species in British America and the Northern Staten 

 are herbaceous plants, and several of them biennials or annuals. 

 In the Southern States, however, there are five plants of the 

 order which assume the character of small trees or erect or 

 twining shrubs. 



In our Flora this order is chiefly remarkable for the large 

 proportion of species of exotic origin. The nutlets are, in some 

 species, furnished with barbed prickles, which cause them to 

 adhere to the coats of animals, but this is of itself not sufiicient 

 to explain the large number of introduced species, and the 

 rapidity with which they seem to have spread. The total 

 number of Canadian Boraginaceoe (excluding those of the North- 

 West) is a little over 20 species, of which one -half are intro- 

 duced ; in the Northern States, Gray enumerates 29 species, of 

 which 11 are introduced; and in the Southern States, Chapman 

 describes 22, of which 3 are introduced. There is a manifest 

 increase of introduced species northwardly 



Mijosotis, Linn. In Professor Gray's " Manual of Botany of 

 the Nort:hern States," 2nd edition, (1856,) Myosotis palustris is 

 described, with the specific name, in the broad -faced type of 

 indigenous species, and as a perennial, but the remark is added^ 

 " Cultivated occasionally;" then it is said that the plant " varies 

 into smaller forms, among which high authorities rank M. 



