70 



SCIENCE 



[K. S. Vol. XXVI. No. 655 



would improve the Swedish husbandry, 

 gardening, manufactures, arts and sci- 

 ences." Dr. Linnajus suggested North 

 America instead, and recommended one of 

 his pupils, Professor Pehr Kalm, of Abo, 

 for the proposed expedition. Kalm spent 

 two years in North America, traveling 

 through Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New 

 York and Canada, and making large collec- 

 tions of seeds and plants, which were pre- 

 served as living or dried specimens or as 

 alcoholic material. During his stay at Rac- 

 coon, New Jersey, he discovered our moun- 

 tain laiirel. The Swedes of Raccoon called 

 it spoon-tree, because the Indians made 

 spoons from its hard wood. Kalm adds in 

 his journal about this tree: "The English 

 call this tree a Laurel, because its leaves 

 resemble those of the Laurocera&iis. Lin- 

 naeus, conformably to the peculiar friend- 

 ship and goodness which he has honored 

 me with, has pleased to call this tree Kalmia 

 foliis ovatis, corymbis terminalihus, or 

 Kalmia latifolia." Here Linnaeus himself 

 gave an illustration of both the pre-Lin- 

 nsean and the post-Linn^ean nomenclature. 

 Kalm became acquainted with several of 

 the naturalists of this country, C. Golden 

 and his daughter Jane, Bartram and Clay- 

 ton, and through Kalm a correspondence 

 was established between them and Linnaeus. 

 Linnaeus also corresponded with John Ellis, 

 who resided in the West Indies, and Dr. 

 Gardiner, who botanized in Carolina and 

 Florida. Later he bought a set of plants 

 collected by Patrick Browne in Jamaica, 

 and received a part of the collections made 

 by Jacquin in the West Indies. 



When the second edition of the "Species 

 Plantarum" appeared, in 1762, Linnseus 

 knew and had described nearly 1,000 plants 

 indigenous to the United States and Can- 

 ada. Besides these, he described about 

 1,000 more, natives of the West Indies, 

 Mexico and Central America, and 400 or 



500 South American plants. His knowl- 

 edge of American plants was small com- 

 pared with what he knew of plants of the 

 old world. "Codex Linnfeanus," which 

 enumerates all plants named by Linnteus, 

 contains not fewer than 8,551 species. 



Linnffius died January 10, 1778, honored 

 and esteemed by all. Some of his work 

 will doubtless live as long as botany is 

 studied by man. 



We see from the preceding account that 

 we may consider Linnseus one of our Amer- 

 ican botanists. Even the little plant which 

 Gronovius dedicated to the Father of Bot- 

 any, the twin-flower of our woods, with its 

 exquisite perfume and its dainty pink 

 flowers, belongs to a genus essentially North 

 American. The genus LinncBa contains 

 four forms, all closely related. One of 

 these, the original Linncea horealis, is eon- 

 fined to the mountain regions of northern 

 and central Europe. Linnaus discovered 

 it on his Lapland journey and it was then 

 considered a very rare plant. Now it seems 

 to be more widely distributed than it was 

 at the time of Linnjeus. Perhaps it is of 

 American origin and has become modified 

 since it transplanted itself on the other 

 side of the ocean. The other three forms 

 are North American. Limuea americana 

 Forbes, which has usually been confounded 

 with its European cousin, is common in the 

 woods from Labrador to Alaska, and ex- 

 tends in the Rocky Mountains as far south 

 as New Mexico. L. longiflora (Torr.) 

 Howell, is found in the mountains from 

 northern California to Alaska. The fourth 

 form is, as far as I know, undescribed and 

 unnamed. It is with great pleasure that 

 I here propose the following name and 

 description for this species: 



LlNN^A SERPYLLIFOLIA Sp. nOV." 



Apparently the same plant has also been 



' The description has been published in the Bul- 

 letin of the New York Botanical Garden. 



