—35— 



NOTES. 



—In the Botanical Gazette for February. 1897. Mr. L F. Hen- 

 derson describes a new species of Isoetes from Idaho, which he 

 dedicates to Dr L M Underwood 



— The Observer of Portland, Conn . has returned to the field 

 from which it retired last October. The numbers lacking for 

 1896 have been printed and the journal starts the new year with 

 fair prospects of success. 



— Under the title '"Among the Ferns," Mr. C. F. Saunders has 

 contributed to the March number of Godeys Magazine a charm- 

 ing sketch of several of our native ferns. Eight fine illustrations 

 by Miss Elizabeth M. Hallowell add interest to the article. 



—On Feb. 5th and 6th, 1897, a very successful meeting of bot- 

 anists was held at Burlington. Vt., the occasion being the second 

 annual meeting of the Vermont Botanical Club. About twenty 

 botanical papers were read. The Club will also hold a ''field 

 meeting " in July. The organization contains sixty members and 

 cordially invites all b tanists in the State of Vermont to join. 

 The secretary, Prof. L. R Jones, Burlington, Vt., will be glad 

 to answer any inquiries about membership, etc. 



— A new Quillwort is described and figured in the Botanical 

 Gazette for January. 1897, by Mr. Raynal Dodge. It has been 

 named Isoetes Eatoni, in honor of the disc >verer, Mr. Alvah A. 

 Eaton. The plant in question is peculiar in being the largest 

 species known to North America. The trunk is sometimes two 

 and three-fourths inches in diameter, with leaves twenty inches 

 or more in length. Some investigations into the chemical nature 

 of the clear white covering of the macrospores of this species 

 lead the writer to conclude that it is mainly silica. 



— Considerable interest attaches to a paper by Prof. Edward C. 

 Jeffrey on "The Gametophyte of Botrychium Virgiuianum," 

 published in the Proceedings of the Canadian Institute for 1896, 

 from the fact that our knowledge of this phase of the plant has 

 until recently been very meagre. The prothallium of Botrychium 

 is subterranean and the difficulty of finding it has hitherto pre 

 vented anything like a complete study. In 1895 Prof. Jeffrey dis 

 covered several hundred prothallia on the margin of a peat bog : 

 with this material in hand a knowledge of all the lacking stages 

 in the development of the young sporophyte has been supplied. 



