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BOTANICAL EXPLORATION OF THE CAYS ON THE 
NORTH COAST OF CAMAGUEY PROVINCE, CUBA. 
Dr. N. L. Britton, DIRECTOR-IN-CHIEF. 
Sir: Sailing from New York City on September 22, Nuevitas, 
Cuba, was reached on the morning of October 2, after the 
usual delay in Nipe Bay, where immediate steps were taken to 
secure a boatman to take me about the cays to the westward. 
The ‘‘Albertia,”’ an open, cabinless, flat-bottomed, center- 
board boat about eighteen feet long, the usual type of craft 
used in these waters, was secured, and headquarters were estab- 
lished at Tiffin, an American colony, about six miles from Nue- 
vitas and near Marinavo Bay, where accommodations were pro- 
vided by Mr. Martin Bessler, resident manager of the colony. 
Owing to much rain and adverse winds it was not until October 
7 that a start was made, when in company with a Cuban sailor, 
I left Tiffin landing and put in at Port Biaro. From here I 
walked to La Gloria in quest of a boy to accompany us, and was 
fortunate to secure Raymond Jenkins, an American lad, well 
white sandy coast, similar to Punta Arenas of Cayo Sabinal which 
I visited the previous spring; its flora also was the same so that very 
few specimens were taken and we continued westward along the 
seaward side of Cayo Romano, whose eastern extremity was seen 
to be a conglomeration of mangrove thickets and shallow lagoons, 
to Pueblo Romano, a small settlement of the employees of a 
henequen plantation. The remainder of the afternoon and the 
greater portion of the next morning was spent here in collecting 
among the low limestone hills, which were covered with a sparse 
shrubby growth. Very few large trees were seen; a bluish-leaved 
Copernicia and a silvery-leaved Coccothrinax were very abundant. 
Sailing about noon on October 9, we proceeded along the sandy 
coast to what seemed to be the end of the range of hills paralleling 
the coast, and marked on some maps as Silla de Cayo, with an 
