826 AN ACCOUNT OF THE GENUS AEGEMONE. 



was first raised by Gerard, avIio sent specimens to his friend 

 C. Bauhin; this explains why Bauhin's name ha})pened to appear 

 before Gerard's. It is rather unfortunate tliat Bauhin's specific 

 epithet was not taken up by Tournefort or by Liunsus, because 

 the one by which it is known is somewhat of a misnomer. The 

 plant came to Gerard from the Antilles, not from Mexico; except 

 as a plant, almost certainly iutrodu.ced, from the vicinity of one or 

 two of the Eastern Mexican seaports, the species is unknown from 

 Mexico in European herbaria. The same is true of the Southern 

 United States ; the only specimens in the herbaria I have consulted 

 that profess to be wild are one from New Orleans, at Kew; one 

 from Frederick County, Virginia, in Herb. Durand — the latter was 

 originally in Nuttall's herbarium; and those from Key Island. 

 Pursh says that it extends as far north as S. Carolina, but admits 

 that it is confined to river-banks. Gardiner and Brace would even 

 insist on its being only an introduction in the Bahamas, and there 

 can be no question as to its being exotic in the Bermudas. The 

 other North American specimens that I have examined are some from 

 Ohio, collected by Lesquereux, and marked "echappe des jardins," 

 and one from Larepe, Wisconsin, glued down with a specimen of 

 the prairie form of A. intermedia, evidently both garden specimens ; 

 both of them were issued from Herb. Hale as A. mexicana. I have 

 therefore refrained from quoting either gathering in the text. It 

 is stated by Wheeler also to occur as an escape near Milwaukee ; 

 I have not seen his specimens. As regards the peninsula of Yucatan 

 and Central America, it is not so clear that the species is introduced, 

 though there is equally an absence of definite evidence that it is 

 indigenous. As regards the southern shores of the Caribbean Sea, 

 the evidence from the specimens I have examined is also doubtful, 

 because there are at Paris specimens collected in New Granada by 

 Triana, marked "region chaud jusqu'a I'hauteur 1000 metres." 

 All the others are, however, from the vicinity of seaport towns. It 

 is moreover strange that there are no specimens from any of the 

 Leeward Islands, and if it occurs in British Guiana or Trinidad, no 

 English botanist has yet sent it to Kew or the British Museum, 

 while if it occurs in Cayenne, no French botanist has yet sent it to 

 Paris. Its rarity in Brazil has already been commented on. There 

 is no apparent reason why the species should not occur in the centre 

 of Mexico, seeing that it has in India spread from Ceylon to Bengal 

 and the Paujab, and occurs everywhere from sea-level to a heignt 

 of 5000 ft. in the Nilghiris and the Himalayas. But, except for 

 specimens collected by Bourgeau in the streets of Cordoba, we have 

 nothing but A. ochroUnica from Central Mexico. There is equally 

 no reason why it should not have extended along the Pacific 

 coasts of America, as well as along the Atlantic seaboard. The fact, 

 however, remains that the only specimens of A. mericawt from the 

 Pacific seaboard in London, Paris, or Geneva are those collected by 

 Seemann at Panama ; the presence of the species there is discounted 

 by the extreme narrowness of the American Continent at that 

 point, and the fact that this is the place at which the isthmus is 

 usually crossed. The epithet peruunus applied by Gerard is thus 



