366 HARPER: COASTAL PLAIN OF THE CAROLINAS 
of distribution center has been noticed before, by Kerr,* Gray,t 
and perhaps others, but apparently not yet explained. 
Another interesting though smaller group of plants includes 
those seen oftener in Virginia than in North Carolina. These 
happen to be all trees and shrubs,{ namely, Oxydendrum arboreum, 
Aralia spinosa, Cornus florida, Rhus copallina, Quercus alba, Q. 
minor, Q. Phellos, Fagus americana and Pinus echinata.§ As I 
traveled 275 miles by rail through North Carolina (or about 295 
including trip from Wilmington to Wrightsville Beach and back 
by electric cars), and only 137 in Virginia by daylight, traversed 
the whole width of the coastal plain in both states, and tried to 
note each species as often as possible, it is safe to assume from the 
returns that all these are at least twice as frequent in southeastern 
Virginia as in the corresponding parts of North Carolina. 
The causes of their greater frequency in Virginia are doubtless 
somewhat complex, and need not be discussed. here. An exami- 
nation of their general distribution and habitats brings out some 
interesting points. In the coastal plain of Georgia and Alabama 
all these species grow on bluffs or in hammocks or bottom-lands, 
especially outside of the pine-barrens, and they evidently belong 
to a stage of vegetation much more nearly approaching the climax 
condition than does that of the pine-barrens. || They are all com- 
mon in the northwestern portion of the coastal plain of Alabama, 
a region notable for the lack of diversity in its flora and the wide 
distribution of nearly all the species inhabiting it.§ 
Some notes on the commoner species of the region traversed, 
and their habitats, may be of interest. The following were seen 
in all three states, and in most of the 2 5 or 30 counties in which 
notes were taken: 
Eupatorium rotundifolium LL. (intermediate pine-barrens, etc.). 
* Rep. Geol. Surv, N, C. 1875: 106. 
ft Am. Jour. Sci. III. 28: 1884. 
{ Probably mostly because herbs are relatively much less abundant and conspicu- 
ous (in natural plant-communities) outside of the pine-barrens. 
or notes on the occurrence of some of these in the vicinity of Dismal Swamp, 
see Ward, Field and Forest 3: 30. 1877; Kearney, Contr. U. S. Nat. Herb. 5: 404, 
476-479. I9gol. 
| See Ann. N. Y. Acad. 17: 103; Plant World 9: 267. 1906. 
{| See Torreya 7: 45. 1907; also Mohr, Contr. U.S. Nat. Herb. 6: go. 1901. 
