OUR MISCELLANY. 



I notice that in my article in the January number of the Fern 

 Bulletin I inadvertently made the name of a fern described, 

 Dryopteris spinulosa glandulosa. Of course it should have 

 been Dryopteris dilatata spinulosa. Force of habit, I suppose, 

 made me write it the other way. — B. D. Gilbert. 



Marsilia quadrifolia is quite common on the Concord river 

 from Concord through Bedford, Carlisle and Billerica, and almost 

 to Lowell. It was sent from the Cambridge Botanic Garden and 

 planted in Concord by Mr. Minot Pratt, and has gradually worked 

 down the river and now may be found m abundance. It grows 

 from 3 to 4 inches to 3 to 4 feet in length. — C. W. Jenks. 



Among our native ferns of larger growth, one of the noblest is 

 Dryopteris cristata Clintoniana. This is a striking form which 

 one would be apt at first glance to associate with D. Goldieana 

 rather than with D. cristata, because of its generous size and a 

 certain indescribable dignity of bearing, if one may use this ex- 

 pression in speaking of a plant. The writer of this paragraph 

 still recalls with pleasure the finding of it in perfection last 

 summer in a wooded mountain swamp in Pennsylvania, where it 

 luxuriated in the black muck amid the moss-grown boles of fallen 

 forest giants. Companions, of its own kith and kin, were 

 D. cristata, D. Bootlii, D. spinulosa inter?nedia, Onoclea sensi- 

 bilis and the Osmundas. — S. 



I heard a local name of a fern this summer, while in the 

 wilds, that interested me. There were three small plants of 

 Boirychiuvi V irginianum growing on a hillside. A country 

 girl with me said, "That's 'sang-sign,' and points to a 'sang' 

 plant." I saw she followed one that was pointing down hill — a 

 sensible thing to do— so I followed the second frond, whose apex 

 was pointing down hill. By a strange coincidence we found a 

 ginseng plant not ten feet away. The ginseng is not common 

 there; but of course is likely to be found where B. Virginiamun 

 is found. I tried to deceive her after that with any triangular 

 fern such as Botrych/ion ternatum or Phegopteris hexagonop- 

 tcra, but she could always distinguish the "sang-sign." — 5. F. 

 Price, Bowling Green, Ky. 



[In Virginia and further south this fern is called "Indi- 

 cator," from its supposed power to indicate ginseng. The base 

 for this curious idea is probably as Miss Price suggests, that the 

 two plants love the same situations. — Ed.] 



