BOTANICAL GAZETTE. I77 
flattened and malformed as in most cases of fasciation, but all placed back to 
back and with perfect individual involucres. Indeed, the heads are in no way 
changed except in their strange position, which was so remarkable as to attract 
the attention of my correspondent, Miss Luther, of Providence, who kindly 
sent the plants for my examination. The three heads combined form a sort of 
pyramid. If the cluster is turned in a certain position the observer sees but one 
disk ata time. It is impossible to view all three at once except from above. 
I think the malformation quite unique. 
Cases of fasciation are common, but perhaps worth noting. Mr. Leland, 
an enthusiastic collector of this city, found a large specimen of Lobelia cardinalis, 
in which apparently two buds had united to produce a uniformly flattened or 
ribbon-like stem. This bore normal flowers. 2 
iss Eloise Butler, of Minneapolis, sends me a specimen of Arisema tr 
phyllum with a double spathe including a single spadix; also a much fasciated 
stalk of Linaria vulgaris, having numerous normal flowers on alternated and 
leafy-bracted pedicels. 
Within a day or two I have seen a garden rose in which, in the center of 
the rosette of petals, was a perfect but unopened flower bud.—W. W. Batley, 
Providence, fo: Sg 
American Ecidia on Ranunculi.—The great difficulty of properly dis- 
tributing ecidia to their respective teleutosporic forms is well brought out by 
trying to arrange our species in accordance with foreign investigations. Uromy- 
ces Pow and U. dactylidis are not known in this country, but a Puccinia on Ra- 
repens does occur. We have an ecidium on 4. abortivus known a8 42. 
Ranuneuli, and one on Anemone nemorosa, both of which have been referred to 
nunculacearum, but without much doubt incorrectly. In fact, the true 4. 
unculacearwm is rare in this country, but occurs, as I am informed by Dr. 
Farlow, near Boston on R. acris, After such excellent investigations 
of Mr. Plowright, we are yet quite in the dark regarding the affinities of our 
own Ranuneuli weidia.—J. C. A 
_The Potétometre.—In Nature, xxx, 79, H. Marshall Ward gives a de- 
“cription and figures of an instruient, the “ potétométre,” recently devised by 
Ul, for measuring the amount of water transpired by plants. The instru- 
des: 
, - It consists essentially of a burette, stoppered at the top and expanded 
ae a bulb just above the lower stopper. This bulb has two orifices near its 
middle, one on the right and another on the left side, at the same height. Into 
r 
right angles, and near to the end which is within the bulb, for the purpose of 
"egulating the size of the bubbles of air which the tube is intended to admit. 
= 
