8 BRAINERD: STEMLESS VIOLETS OF THE SOUTH 
to have been so in the type specimens, as the author makes no 
mention of any pubescence. But usually more or less hairiness 
appears on the petioles and lower leaf surfaces, and they are some- 
times densely villous. 
VIOLA BLANDA Willd. is glabrous except for scattered white 
hairs on the upper surface of leaves that unfold at flowering. But 
in Tryon, N. C., I found a colony without a trace of white hairs; 
and plants transferred to the garden, and their offspring, have 
continued perfectly glabrous. 
The type of VIOLA RENIFOLIA Gray is markedly pubescent 
throughout; but the more common form has at least the upper 
leaf surface glabrous, and has been published as a species, 
V. Brainerdii, by Professor Greene.* But the difference 
between the two plants, though perhaps worth naming, is not 
specific, according to my conception of species. 
VIOLA INCOGNITA Brainerd is also inconstant as respects 
pubescence. The type has ‘‘peduncles, petioles and lower surface 
of leaves pubescent with soft white hairs especially when young, 
the upper leaf surface glabrous or nearly so.”’"{ But in low moist _ 
woods nearly glabrous forms are frequent, usually with minute 
white hairs on the upper surface of the later leaves, as in V. 
blanda. Though in all other characters these two forms are 
identical, yet I find their marked difference in pubescence has been 
a source of confusion to students of Viola: and I would therefore 
distinctly mark off this form, as 
Viola incognita, var. Forbesii, var. nov. Nearly or quite 
glabrous, except often for scattered white hairs on the upper leaf 
surface; otherwise like the type. A common form in moist wood- 
lands, from eastern Quebec westward to Wisconsin, and southward 
to the mountains of eastern Tennessee. 
All forms of V. incognita, except certain hybrids, differ from 
V. blanda Willd. in having at maturity broader leaves with 
deeper and wider sinus at the base, in having the lateral petals 
bearded, the upper petals obovate and not porrect, and in flowering 
a week or two earlier. But the most marked difference appears in 
the seeds, which in V. incognita are obtuse at base, brown, smooth, 
* Pittonia 5:89. 1902. 
+ Rhodora 7: 248. 31 D 1905. 
