BOTANY. G95 



part of the contributions to North American pteridology for 1883. The 

 thirteenth and fourteenth parts of Eaton's New or Little Known Ferns of 

 the United States, include a number of new forms, principally Western 

 species. In Watson's List of Plants from Southwestern Texas and North- 

 em Mexico there is an enumeration of ferns by Eaton, with two new 

 species, Cheilanthes meifolia and Ch. cinnamomea. In Fern Notes, No. 6, 

 G. E. Davenport records the occurrence of some interesting forms, and 

 the Bulletin also contains a description of a new species from Arizona, 

 Cheilanthes Pringlei, Davenport. The same writer has a paper on the 

 distribution of ferns in the United States in the Proc. Am. Phil. Soc. A 

 new variety of Gamptosorus rhizophyllus, var. inter medus, is described by 

 J. C. Arthur in the Bot. Gazette. The Development of the Male Prothal- 

 Hum of the field horse-tail is the subject of an illustrated paper in the 

 Am. Naturalist. 



Comparatively little has been written this year on exotic forms. The 

 most extensive work is Beddome's Handbook to the Ferns of British India, 

 Ceylon, and the Malay Archipelago. The Journal of Botany has a Synop- 

 sis of the genus Selaginella, by J. G. Baker, continued through several 

 numbers. Kuhn, in Bericht. Deutsch. Bot. Gesell., has an account of the 

 ferns of Socotra, and in Engler's Jahrbuecher Luerssen refers to species 

 from Japan and the Loo-Choo Islands. The first part of Adolph 

 Oborny's Flora of Moravia and Austrian Silesia contains the vascular 

 cryptogams of that region. In the Journal of Botany Hauce describes 

 seven new ferns from China and Formosa, and Baker gives a list of 

 ferns from east tropical Africa, including two new species collected by 

 Bev. J. Hanningtou. 



PH^ENOGAMS. 



Additions to our knowledge of North American Phamogams have 

 been very numerous, although most of them have been rather brief and 

 in the form of notes in the different botanical journals published in this 

 country. The most important paper is that of Professor Gray in Proc. 

 Am. Acad. Boston on Characters of new Compositce with revision of certain 

 genera and critical notes. This is followed by Miscellaneous Genera and 

 Species in which a considerable number of new forms are described and 

 synopses of American species of Valerianella, Buchnera, and Orthoearpu* 

 are given in foot-notes. The eleventh part of Sereno Watson's contri- 

 butions to American botany iu the Proc. Am. Acad, is devoted to a con- 

 tinuation of the I/ist of Plants from Southwest Texas and Northern Mex- 

 ico, principally collected by E. Palmer in 1879-'80. This portion in- 

 cludes all from Gamopetalce to Acotyledons. The determinations of the 

 species of Compositce included in the list are by Professor Gray. The 

 ferns and mosses were determined by D. C. Eaton aud T. P. James. 

 In the same journal is a Description of some new Western Species by 

 Watson. A Supplement to Chapman's Southern Flora has been issued, 

 including a large number of species particularly from Florida, which 



