i_ General Notes. [ February, 
GENERAL NOTES. 
BOTANY.! 
Exotic Pants arounp San Francisco Bay. — Many of the 
species of the Australian eucalypti and acacias mature their seeds in the 
climate of the shores and neighborhood of San Francisco Bay; many 
of the foreign geraniums and fuchsias also seed and fruit in the open 
air, though exposed more or less to the trade-winds; this is notably the 
case at the university grounds at Berkeley, which are in a line due east 
from the Golden Gate. — R. E. C. STEARNS. 
PREISSIA COMMUTATA. — In a communication to the editor, Mr. 
Henry Gillman: reports Preissia commutata (liverwort) at Laughing 
Fish River, and Eagle River, Michigan, at White-Fish Bay, Wisconsin, 
and several other localities on the Lakes. The plant occurs chiefly on 
sandstone. 
SEQUOIA SEMPERVIRENS. — The statement on page 571 of the NAT- 
URALIsT for 1875, of the discovery of a grove of colossal redwood 
trees, Sequoia sempervirens, proves to have been a hoax. 
Very large specimens of this species are occasionally met with in the 
forests of the Coast Range. Six miles east of Stewart’s Point and twenty- 
three miles west of Healdsburg, in Sonoma County, a fine specimen may 
be seen on the farm of James McCappin ; it is not far from three hun- 
dred feet in height, and reaches up about one hundred feet to the first 
limb ; it is quite straight and symmetrical, and measures seventy-one feet 
four inches in circumference at one foot from the ground ; seven feet 
higher the circumference is forty-six feet. — R. E. C. STEARNS. 
ÆSTIVATION OF THE Fucusia. — “In the books,” the petals of the 
fuchsia are described as convolute. At my request, one of my students 
examined one hundred and fifty-nine flowers of various species, hybrids, 
and varieties. The petals exhibited sixteen different modes of arrange- 
ment with reference to each other. Only twenty-eight, about one sixth, 
were regularly convolute; of these, twenty-one twisted to the right, and 
seven to the left. Seventy-five flowers, nearly half of all examined, had 
one petal outside at each edge, the others in regular order. In thirty- 
Seven cases, one petal was entirely outside, the one opposite to it had 
both edges covered by those next to it. 
The foregoing remarks are kindred to those on Phyllotaxis of Cones, 
in the NaTuRAtist, vii. 449, and on Imbricative ¥stivation, viii. 705.— 
W. J. Bear. ; 
VALLISNERIA SPIRALIS. — This plant, growing in moderately deep 
water in the south of Europe, has long been a favorite object of cultivation 
in aquaria, from the clearness with which the rotation of the protoplasm 
1 Conducted by Pror. G. L. GOODALE. 
