316 Howe: Preliminary notes on the genus Usnea 



only represents a state, the comparative, yet supposedly diagnostic 

 terms, "lax," or "rather lax," are so indefinite as applied to the 

 filamentous forms of this genus that they are really meaningless. 

 In Alectona, * the contrast is sufficient, and elimmates the personal 



equation. 



It IS interesting to note that in Tuckerman's Synopsis of 1848 

 (p. 8) he not only includes the contingent form strigosa which he 

 later dropped, but does not include ceratina which he later in- 

 cluded. It must be remembered that the former work referred 

 to '* New England and other Northern States," the region now 

 under consideration, while the work of 1882 considered the 

 lichens of all North America. If ceratina occurs in New Eng- 

 land, then the statement of Tuckerman (1882), /. ^., *'apothe- 

 cia middling to large, rarer in extreme (mountain) forms, which 

 pass into c'' (= dasypoga)^ must be made at 



in Transition zone 



(== dasypogd) 



the Austral zone, and even then it seems we must leave the sepa- 

 ration of ceratina from the following subspecies to practically the 

 presence or absence of ample apothecia, which would again only 

 emphasize the distinguishing of forms on fertile or sterile states. 

 Ceratina no doubt is a rare subspecies in New England, as Tucker- 

 man himself plainly indicates \ and of the Tuckerman Us7iea 

 material that I have examined to date, not a single example has 

 been found and in all the New England material I have examined, 

 but a few examples can be placed here. Willey included it in his 

 New Bedford list, but ho\V typically or commonly represented we 

 do not know, as no annotations are given. I have seen but three 

 fruited specimens from New England, all collected by Miss Cum- 

 mings at Plymouth, N. H., and all lacking lateral fibrils. Shaerer 

 defined it as " fibrillosa vel efibrillosa/' but if we are logical in 

 our taxonomy it would seem that we must either propose a name 



for this naked 



ph 



of dasypoga (see Engler & Prantl), or recognize naked condi- 

 tions of both coarse ceratina and slender dasypoga, under one 

 species plicata, which seems distinctly inadvisable. 



* Between A. chalybeiformis and A, implexa. 



