REPORT ON THE DEPARTMENT OF RECENT PLANTS IN THE U. S 

 NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1888. 



By Lester F. Wakd, Honorary Curator. 



In the latter part of July I left Washiugton, accompanied by Professor 

 ^ Knowlton, for a two months' expedition to the Yellowstone National 

 Park, Wyoming. The primary object of the expedition was to make a 

 collection of fossil plants from this locality, but as opportunity offered 

 collections of living plants were also made. The collection includes 

 about three- hundred species of flowering plants and about twenty- 

 five species of mosses. A few were obtained in the vicinity of Bozeman, 

 Montana, and on the road to the Park. The collections in the Park are 

 mostly from the northeastern portion and about the principal geyser 

 areas, and include several species new to the flora of the region. We 

 returned to Washington about October 1. 



Considerable time has been spent during the year in the determina- 

 tion of the specimens collected in the National Park, and also in se- 

 lecting and verifying the identification of some of the material collected 

 during the past two years in the District of Columbia. About one 

 thousand species of these cultivated plants have been mounted and 

 placed in the herbarium. 



Among the many valuable accessions received during the year may 

 be mentioned the following : Collection of seven hundred and sixty- 

 eight species made in Mexico by Dr. Edward Palmer. This material 

 is from a locality rarely visited by botanists, and contained many spe- 

 cies that have been determined by Watson, Gray, Vasey, and others 

 to be new to science. Equally valuable, although not as large, is the 

 collection made by Mr. C. G. Pringle in another part of Mexico. It 

 embraces two hundred and sixty-three species, a number of which are 

 new. 



Baron Ferd. v. Miiller, of Melbourne, Australia, donated an inter- 

 esting collection of nearly five hundred species of Australian plants. 

 These were especially desirable, as there were before almost no speci- 

 mens from A^ustralia in the herbarium. 



From the late Dr. Emil Bessels came a small but valuable collection 



of Arctic plants, obtained by him mostly from the island of Spitz- 



bergen. 



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