192 VEGETATION 



trees. Three are listed in this report and five others are given by Xorthrop, 

 Hitchcock and Urban. It is very doubtful, however, if there are as many 

 as eight species represented in these collections, and I think it nnlikely that 

 there are more than this nimiber of indigenous figs in all the islands of the 

 group. 



The Loranthacece are credited with seven or eight species, but here also 

 the nomenclature has probably been confused. This family is not nearly so 

 abimdant in the Bahamas as in some of our other tropical islands, as Jamaica 

 and Cuba. The Polygonaceai, represented in temperate countries only by 

 herbaceous species, comprise a number of Bahama trees of the genus CoccoJohis. 

 Some of them arc among the most common plants of the Islands. No water 

 lilies (Nymphoeaceoe) had been found until we collected CastaUa ampla (DC.) 

 Green, on Cat Island, and it remains the only indigenoiis species of that 

 family so far reported. The great group, Cruciferce, so abundant in the United 

 States, is represented only by the widely distributed littoral plant Cakile 

 cequaUs L' Her., and the introduced weed, Lcpidium vlrginicum L. Of the 

 rose family, Chrysohalamis and Primus are the only Bahama genera. The 

 first is represented by two species, the pink-fruited and black-fruited cocoa 

 plums; the second by but one species, Prunns sphwrocarpa Sw., known only 

 from iS^ew Providence. The Mimosacece, rarely found in the United States, 

 furnished some of the largest and most useful trees of the Islands, such as the 

 horseflesh and will tamarind. The Cassiacece and PapilionacecB are also well 

 represented. The proportion of woody species to herbaceous ones is greater in 

 these families than it is in the United States. Of the Zygophyllacece, Guaiacum 

 (Lignum vitse) and two species of Trihulus are all that have been collected. 

 Trihuhis cistoides L. is reported only by Hitchcock. We did not see it at any 

 point and its evident rarity is remarkable when we consider its wide distribu- 

 tion and abundance on other tropical shores. The Linacece comprise several 

 species of Erytliroxylon and two species of Linuin. Of the latter Linum cur- 

 tissii Small is a new species found by Dr. Britton on Xew Providence and soon 

 to be published. The Euphorbiacece is one of the most extensive families of 

 the Islands. Most of its representatives are woody species and many of them 

 are trees. The peculiar shrub, Bonaniia cuhana A. Eich., of our collection, 

 had not before been found out of Cuba, and the large tree, Pera humelicef olia 

 Griseb., also collected by us, has not heretofore been published from the Ba- 

 hamas. Securinego acidothamnus (Griseb.) Muell. Arg., collected by us on 

 Andros, had not previously been found north of St. Thomas. The Celastracece, 



