eties. I have seen no typical Engehnanni from south of Pennsyl- 

 vania. 



Maine : Fernald, according to Dodge, though there are no 

 specimens in Fernald's collection, which he has kindly sent to me 

 for examination. New Hampshire : in nearly every mill pond or 

 ditch with clay bottom in Rockingham county. Massachusetts : 

 common in the eastern part. Rhode Island : Newport, Farloic, fide 

 Dodge. Connecticut : Meriden, Hall; Waterford and Groton, 

 Graves. 



i2a. I. ENGELMANNI GRACILIS Engelm. 



An attenuate form of the type, and often growing with it ; ap- 

 parently caused more by environment than any inherent qualities. 



Seabrook, N. H., June 27, 1900. 



THE SYSTEJ1 OF FERNS PROPOSED IN DIE 

 NATUERLICHEN PFLANZENFAHILIEN. 



Bv LUCIEN M. UNDERWOOD. 



To those familiar only with the system of Fern Genera 

 that has been followed in Synopsis Fi/icum, and in its main 

 features has been accepted in its application to the ferns of 

 North America by most who have made our ferns a study, the sys- 

 tem proposed in Engler & Prantl's Die Natiterlichen Pflanzenfa- 

 milien will present many strange features ; yet, on the whole, it is 

 to be regarded as a very conservative arrangement. Nevertheless, 

 while the true ferns (Polypodiaceae) of Synopsis Filicum number 

 only 47 genera, the same group in the present arrangement is dis- 

 tributed among 109 ; and were the system as uniformly consistent 

 as it is in places, the number would quite readily be increased to 

 three times that of Synopsis Filicum. Mettenius, Kuhn, and Prantl, 

 the three great German fern taxonomists, have all passed away, 

 and it was left to a novice among ferns but none the less a trained 

 botanist to bring the genera together ; it is to be judged then in 

 this light, and not as the result of a long continued personal study. 

 While it is a great improvement on the system that has too long 

 been in vogue as the expression of a part of the obsolete English 

 school of fern taxonomists, it is still lacking in many of the charac- 

 teristics and consistencies that a genuine system must possess. 



