Ridgway.] 306 [February 18, 



southward, but nearly all extend northward well into the Wabash 

 Valley. 



The vegetation of the lower Wabash Valley if not essentially 

 southern has a very decided impress of the southern character, the 

 subtropical forms mentioned above being the main desiderata. 

 Among the forest trees the pecan {Gary a olivceformis) extends up the 

 Wabash as far as Terre Haute; the bald cypress (Taxodiwn dis- 

 tichuni) forms a swamp in Knox Co., Indiana, covering seventeen 

 thousand acres; 1 the catalpa (C bignonioides) is a common under- 

 wood throughout the bottom-lands south of Vincennes; while the 

 tupelo gum (Nyssa uniflora), water locust (Gleditschia monosperma), 

 southern hackberry (Celtis mississippiensis) and lyre-leafed oak (Quer- 

 cus lyratd) are more or less abundant in the woods. The tropical 

 family Bignoniacece has four representatives, viz., Catalpa bignonioi- 

 des, Bignonia capreolata. Tecoma radicans and Martynia proboscidea 

 — all abundant — only one other species ( Tecoma starts, found in 

 Florida) occurring in the United States. Besides these southern 

 plants, the Cocculus carolinus, several southern species of Smilax and 

 Cuscuta, the Hibiscus grandiflorus, Cabomba caroliniana, Nelumbium 

 luteum (growing in great abundance and magnificence) and a host 

 of other strictly southern species attest the decidedly southern na- 

 ture of vegetation of the lower Wabash. 2 Among the southern 

 reptiles the following species have been found near Mt. Carmel: 3 An- 

 cistrodon piscivorus (the dreaded "cotton-mouth" or moccasin of south- 

 ern plantations) , Eutamia faireyi, E . dorsalis, E. proxima, Tropidonotus 

 erythrogaster, T. transversus, Heterodon cognatus, Coluber conjinis, 



* "Wabash County, Illinois, contains 128,420 acres ; 69,853, or more than one-half 

 of this area is woodland, most of which is primitive forest. (County assessment of 

 1873.) 



2 In this connection the reader is referred to the following papers by the writer, 

 published in the American Naturalist: — Notes on the Vegetation of the lower 

 Wabash Valley. — I. The Forests of the Bottom Lands, Vol. vi, Nov., 1872.— 

 II. Peculiar Features of the Bottom Lands, Vol. VI, Dec, 1872. — III. The Woods 

 and Prairies of the Upland Portions, Vol. vn, March, 1873. 



3 In giving the above list of Ophidians, I must acknowledge the valuable assist- 

 ance rendered me in this line by my friend Mr. Lucien M. Turner, of Mt. Carmel, 

 who has collected many of the species named, and has them in his possession. The 

 doubtful of these have been determined by Professor Cope, so that their identifi- 

 cation is authentic. My authorities for the other species are Mr. Kennicott's 

 list in the first volume of the Illinois Agricultural Report (1853, pp. 591-593), and 

 the invoice sheets and specimens in the Smithsonian Collection. The total number 

 of species of serpents known with certainty to be found in Illinois, is about 45 ; 

 this number no doubt will be increased to considerably more than fifty species. 



