293 



be regarded as one of the rare plants of the western continent. 

 There would seem, however, no obvious reason why it may not 

 be found in the waters of northerly Vermont, New York, Michi- 

 gan or Minnesota. In fact, its detection in Chautauqua Lake 

 should not be regarded as very singular. It may be reasonably 



?//, 



M 



Lobelia Doj'tvianua are present. 



Since the Muskoka discovery, I have received from my friend, 

 '. Meehan, of Germantown, Pennsylvania, a note, mentioning 

 the fact that, in the herbarium of the Academy of Natural Sciences 

 at Philadelphia there are thirteen specimens oi Siihidaria aqitatica, 

 ■and with them a label, (intended for one of them), which reads, 

 " The Delaware River, Ellas Durand." Below, in the handwrit- 

 ing of Mr. Redfield, are the words, " For all this positive state- 

 ment of Durand, I doubt whether he g-Qt it there. No one else 



has found it there." One of the thirteen specimens Mr. Meehan 

 regards as very different from the rest. He writes : — " The stem 

 is flexuous where the pedicels connect and the pedicels them- 

 selves coarser in every way. This difference does not seem to 

 have attracted Mr. Redfield's notice, and it looks, for all the world, 

 like one who grew away from its home centre — possibly the Del- 

 aware." A pen-and-ink sketch accompanies the statement and 

 .shows the plant to be very peculiar in its habit. 



Prior to the receipt of Mr. Meehan's letter, I had noticed the 

 fact that, for so small a plant, the Muskoka specimens presented 

 among themselves, one remarkable variation. Few of tiie speci- 

 mens were more than one- flowered. I think no one had more 

 than three. The scapes of the one-flowered specimens were 

 surely much thicker and heavier than of those Vv'hich were two- 

 or three-flowered. In this respect they also diflfered greatly from 

 the Oakes specimens, of which I have two or three, and with 

 which 1 carefully compared them. 



The conclusion which I draw from all these facts is this : 

 there should now be an ample collection of specimens from all 

 the known localities and a careful comparison made of them with 

 those in the eastern herbaria. As suggested in Mrs. Slosson's 

 article, the time of flowering given by Gray— " June and 

 July "—is much too early. Hence, no doubt, the repeated foilures 



