155 



February 21, 1855. 

 The President in the Chair. 



Extracts from a letter from Mr. Roswell Field, of Gill, 

 Mass., to Dr. H. I. Bowditch, were read to the Society. 

 Mr. Field informs the Society, that he has lately quarried a 

 sandstone slab, which he considers the most valuable one 

 yet obtained, having upon it about two hundred foot-prints, 

 and five or six tracks. 



Dr. Bryant called the attention of the Society to the 

 present condition of the Entomological Collection, and the 

 want of a Curator for this department. Expressing a will- 

 ingness to take charge of the collection for the present, he 

 was requested by a vote to do so. 



Mr. C. J. Sprague read the following paper on Ranun- 

 culus micranthus (Crowfoot ; Buttercup) : — 



The Ranunculus micranthus, of Nuttall, belongs to the western 

 border of the Mississippi, and probably extends to the Pacific ; as 

 Torrey and Gray describe, doubtfully, a Californian variety. It 

 has been found also near Lake Superior ; but this was, I believe, 

 its eastern linnit, until I discovered it growing plentifully on a 

 rocky, shady, springy, wooded hill in Melrose, about seven miles 

 fronn Boston. At first sight, it would be mistaken for R. abor- 

 tivus, for which, indeed, I first collected it ; but on a closer exam- 

 ination it presents certain differences. The radical leaves of 

 ahortivus are cordate-reniform in outline, with a deep sinus, and 

 a regularly crenate border ; those of micranthus are rhombic- 

 ovate, truncate at base, with large and irregular lobate serratures. 

 They are generally entire in ahortivus, although they are some- 

 times three-lobed, and even ternately parted ; in micranthus, X\\\s 

 division is very common, and almost constant. The leaves of 

 the latter are also more numerous and more clustered, the divis- 

 ions of the stem leaves narrowier, and the whole plant is of a 



