116 



be comparatively scarce north of the Tennessee River. Among 

 these pines are a number of shallow ponds strongly resembling 

 some of those near the inland edge of the pine-barrens in 

 Georgia. In them besides the Pinus Taeda were Panicnm agros- 

 toidcs Muhl., Cy penis psendovcgctiis Steud., Rliynchospora cornic- 

 idata (Lam.) Gray, R. glomerata paniadata (Gray) Chapm., 

 Carex glaiiccsccns Ell. (abundant), Xyris sp., Liqiddainbar Styra- 

 cifliia L., RJiexia s'p.,.Ludzi.'igia glatididosa Walt., CcpJialantliiis 

 occidentalis L. and Plucliea petiolata Cass. ; and around the edges 

 of one, EriantJms strictus Baldw. and Juncus repens Michx. Of 

 these Carex glaiicescens was previously supposed to be confined to 

 the coastal plain, and the two Rhynchosporas mainly so. Erian- 

 tliiis strictus had been reported from near Tullahoma and Jack- 

 son, Tennessee, by Dr. Gattinger, but was otherwise known only 

 from the coastal plain, from Georgia and Florida to Texas. In 

 Georgia I have seen it only in places where the Lafayette formation 

 seems to be absent, a condition which is of course fulfilled at the 

 locality here described. The case oi Juiicns repens has already 

 been mentioned above. 



In alluvial bottoms in the southern part of Limestone County, 

 especially in the Tennessee River swamps opposite Decatur, I 

 saw considerable quantities of Xyssa iiidfiora Wang., and I was 

 informed that it is an important timber tree there. This species 

 is not generally known to occur outside of the coastal plain,* 

 though I have seen it at a few places in the metamorphic and 

 Palaeozoic regions of Georgia. 



This discovery of several more coastal plain (or " pine-barren," 

 or " austroriparian ") plants in the mountain region of Alabama 

 lends additional interest to the problem of explaining their occur- 

 rence there. The solution of this problem — which is by no 

 means hopeless, though I am not prepared to undertake it at 

 present — must go hand in hand with the study of the geological 

 history of the regions involved, the details of which are still very 

 imperfectly known. Although the flora of Alabama has prob- 



* Its occurrence north of the Tennessee River in Alabama is mentioned inciden- 

 tally and in a very inconspicuous way on page 43 of Bulletin 58 of the U. S. 

 Bureau of Forestry, published in the summer of 1905. 



