302 PROCEEDINGS: BOSTON SOCIETY NATURAL HISTORY. 



flora of the island. Forty-two new species, including two new genera, 

 have been discovered on the island. 



The vegetative conditions of Margarita are much more varied than 

 those of the other islands. Margarita has both a rich mountain flora 

 and also the flora of arid plains and hills. Cura9oa and the others 

 possess only arid vegetative conditions. 



In regard to the comparison of the flora with that of adjacent re- 

 gions, it is much to be regretted that data are so insufficient as to lessen 

 the value of any comparison and in some cases actually to prohibit it. 

 The flora of Margarita comprises all the plants found on Coche with 

 three exceptions. The other small islands are probably similar in this 

 respect. La Tortuga has twenty-three out of sixty-nine plants not to 

 be found on Margarita and Los Roques has four out of twenty-eight 

 not on ]\Iargarita. Though it is impossible to speak accurately of 

 Cura9oa, to judge by the references cited on previous pages there are 

 about four hundred plants there of which one hundred are not on 

 Margarita. 



Although there is a large list (240) of plants of Margarita not pub- 

 lished as occurring in Venezuela, it is probable that a large proportion 

 of them do. The vegetation on the mainland (near Carupano and 

 Cumana) opposite Margarita is identical in appearance with that of 

 Margarita. 



Trinidad has a very large flora, yet over two hundred Margaritan 

 plants have not been reported from there, and are not in the Herbarium 

 of the Trinidad botanical gardens. 



The entire chain of islands to the east of the Caribbean Sea possesses 

 a vegetation consisting of many species not to be found on ISIargarita. 

 It is of a much more luxuriant character. In the extensive flora of 

 Porto Rico so far as can be ascertained there are less than one hundred 

 INIargaritan plants to be found. Most of these are common to the 

 American tropics. 



In the flora of the Cayman islands it is seen that out of their two 

 hundred and twenty-eight species only eighty-four are on Margarita. 

 The reference to the plants of the southern United States similarly 

 shows about a hundred from Margarita which are, however, cosmo- 

 politan. 



In the comparison of the flora with that of other regions about the 

 Caribbean Sea it is evident that the flora of Margarita is largely com- 

 posed of plants common to many parts of the American tropics. It 



