408 BOTANICAL GAZETTE [NOVEMBER 
succeeding year enclosed in the base of the common stalk, smooth, 
the segments nearly erect or with the apices barely incurved. 
Spores maturing in early spring (February or March in the latitude 
of southern and central Alabama). Plate X.XJ. 
The plant was first collected by Michaux in South Carolina, and 
was described by Lamarck under the name of Osmunda bilernata. 
Seven years later Michaux himself described it under the name of 
Botrypus lunarioides, while Swartz referred it to Botrychium, but unfor- 
tunately under the later name. Later writers confused all our northem 
forms that now constitute the somewhat variable Boftrychium ternatum 
of our manuals under Michaux’s name. Professor D. C. Eaton clearly 
distinguished this form and figured it in his Ferns of North America, 
but overlooked its very distinct leaf and bud characters, and supposed 
that its time of maturity was due to its southern station. As a matter 
of fact the true Botrychium rernatum is comparatively common in 
central Alabama, and produces its mature spores late in the season 
(August to October), the same as it does farther north. In Alabama 
the stations where B. sernatum is found are very different from those 
affected by this species. 2. sernatum grows in moist places, frequently 
near the smaller water courses, while &. diternatum is found on dry, 
usually grassy, knolls, or dry pastures. ; 
My attention was called first to the unusual fruiting time of this 
species by Dr. Mohr, while looking through his collection of ferns a 
winter. He regarded the form as found at Mobile as a distinct species: 
In the following March I found a single plant growing on a a | 
knoll in Auburn, when I recognized clearly the distinctness of the 
species, and this conclusion has been fully confirmed by the bud ee 
acters as well as the spores. I find several specimens from Sout 
Carolina in the collection of Columbia University, and shall be ge 
to know of its further occurrence, since our present knowledge of its 
distribution limits it to these two states and Georgia, which was the 
source of Eaton’s figure above cited. Judging from the single speci: 
men found by myself, collectors will have to get down on their — 
more if they expect to find this plant, and the same is true of some . 
the other small Ophioglossacez of the Gulf states. a 
The species is readily distinguished from B. ternatum by its pee 
sessile and more compound sterile leaf, as well as by the form 0 i 
ultimate divisions, which are distinctly rounded and short, lacking 
3 Eaton’s figure Tepresents a small and possibly immature plant. 
