114 THE JOURNAL OF BOTANY 



founded Pennsylvania. The distribution of V. Manillas in the 

 Midlands is very restricted. We have no definite record of the 

 species in Northants ; it is absent from Cambridge and Hunts ; in 

 North Oxfordshire a small heathy tract on the glacial drift is said 

 to have yielded a plant or two; and there are only two other 

 localities on the Chilterns in the south of the county, where it is 

 very scarce. In North Berkshire, Bagley Wood is the only locality ; 

 with the exception of the Brickhill district there are no other 

 localities in North Bucks. The Brickhill and Woburn area is 

 therefore practically an outlier, and shut off from the other English 

 localities by considerable distances, which may have restricted the 

 use of the common name. It may be borne in mind that the word 

 M huckle " is widely spread in the Upper Thames and Ouse district 

 for a joint. The M huckle-bone " of a sheep is or was often kept in 

 the pocket as a prophylactic for rheumatism. This name is cited 

 in Wright's E7igli$h Dialect Dictionary, iii. 264, in the same sense, 

 and " huckle-back " is used for a bent back. I venture to ask if 

 the jointed appearance of the stems may not have suggested the 

 name, rather than the corruption from whorts or whortleberry. 



G. Claridge Druce. 



When 



of 



Huckleberry, I had no expectation of eliciting so interesting a note 

 as the above. Instances of a name confined to a limited area are 

 not unknown, but in the present instance the matter is complicated 

 by its general use in the United States. It may be hoped that 

 some American botanist will throw further light on the matter, and 

 it would be of interest to find some derivation of the word more 

 probable than that suggested by Mr. Druce, which I do not think 

 can be maintained. The name does not appear in our Dictionarij 

 of English Plant-Names, nor in the numerous MS. additions thereto. 



James Britten. 



NOTES ON SOME TROPICAL AFRICAN RUBIACE$. 



By Spencer le M. Moore, B.Sc, F.L.S. 



In the lately issued part of Engler's Botanische Jahrbiicher (vol 

 xxxix. pp. 516-571) appears a memoir by Dr. K. Krause, wherein 

 are described a number of Rubiacea from Tropical Africa. Dr. 

 Krause's descriptions are in every way admirable, and he bids fair 

 worthily to fill the void left by the premature decease of Dr. Karl 

 Schumann, an author among whose numerous contributions to 

 systematic botany those on Rubiacem are by no means the least im- 

 portant. Dr. Krause, however, has had the misfortune— one to 

 which all are liable now that bibliography has become so extensive 

 —of overlooking work already published, namely, mine on Mr. T. 

 Kassner's plants in this Journal for 1905 (pp. 249-251 and 350-SJ, 

 and also the memoir in the Journal of the Linnean Society, vol. 



xxxvii. pp. 298 sqq. This necessitates alteration in a few of his 

 names ; while directing attention to this, the opportunity is taken 



