1895.] Notes from My Herbarium. 13 
of the plant, with its copious roots and running rootstocks 
complete. I find this a most satisfactory way of showing the 
character of the plant. The stocks are tough, wiry, and about 
a foot long. A specimen like this can easily be supplemented 
by other specimens, showing individual parts separately. 
The character of this grass as a binder of the sea sand is 
well known. When the ever-shifting sands bury the plant a 
foot deep or more from its base, it appears as usual the next 
looking exactly like a wire, and rising straight from the cen- 
ter of the old plant. I have a plant from Nantasket Beach, 
Mass., showing this peculiarity. 
RANUNCULUS CYMBALARIA Pursh. Sea-side crowfoot. 
This species of crowfoot grows by the sea in various kinds 
of soil. The average height of the scape is from four to six 
inches. I have a vigorous plant from the Charles river salt 
marshes in Cambridge, with a scape eleven inches high. A 
Most interesting feature of the plant is its long rooting run- 
ners. It is not always that these runners have a chance to 
display their greatest activity. When growing amongst other 
plants, such as grasses and the like, the plant seems to reach 
a greater development, but the runners have little chance to 
display themselves. On July 20, 1894, at Wells, Me., I found 
this plant growing in a ditch of soft black mud. It covered 
a Space of a few square yards, and was literally yellow with 
flowers, No other plant of any kind hindered its growth and 
the runners were interlaced in every direction. I took upa 
Single plant with six runners attached. The longest runner 
was two feet one inch long, and rooted eight times. The 
plant rooting at the first node was fully developed, bore a 
Ower, and was sending forth a secondary runner which had 
already rooted twice. Another runner rooted seven times, 
the first plant bearing a bud, while the smallest runner rooted 
three times. The parent plant was small, the scape being 
barely three inches high, as if its numerous progeny had sapped 
its strength. By careful manipulation I arranged the plant 
So that it would come within the limits of a mounting sheet, 
without crowding the runners. It tells a most interesting 
story of rapid propagation. 
