often be found with one-half the annulus normal, the other half 

 developed as a normal sheath and bearing branches. 

 Seabrook. N. H. 



[Sets of the forms illustrating this species were sent out in 

 January with the sheets of E. Telmateia. Complete sets from the 

 beginning of this series may be obtained by applying to Mr. Eaton 

 at once. In the article on E. fialustre the New Jersey station for 

 it should read Closter, N. J. — Ed.] 



BOTRYCHIUM MATRICARIAEFOLIUM A. Br * 



By George E. Davenport. 



OME specimens of this species recently received from Berlin 



through Mr. Greenman show how wholly indefensible is the 



position which Dr. Underwood has taken in the latest (6th) 

 edition of his "Native Ferns" on the status of our American 

 plants. 



It is difficult to understand how he could have made such rash 

 statements as those which intimate the non-existence of this 

 species in the United States, and that, too, in the face of the fact 

 that nearly all European authorities have recognized the identity 

 of the European and American plants. 



Luerssen cites " Onondaga County in New York," as well as 

 "Unalaska" and "Canada," thus showing that he recognized our 

 American plants as being identical with the European. One has 

 only to compare the admirable figures of European forms in 

 Luerssen's " Die Farnprlanzen" with a series of forms from any 

 part of the United States or Canada to be convinced of their pos- 

 itive identity. That the species has been much confused with B. 

 lanceolatum, B. lunar za, B. simplex and even B. ternatum, at 

 times, there is abundant evidence to show, but the following brief 

 summary of the more important data stands out clearly in its 

 history: 



The species appears to have been known to Breyn as Lunaria 

 matricaricefolio (Cent, i, T. 94, 167S), and to have been referred 

 to Osmitnda lunaria as var. y by Linnaeus in 1755 (Flora Suec, 

 Ed. II., p. 369). From this time until Braun brought out its dis- 

 tinctive character more clearly in Doll Rhein. Flora (1843) under 

 Breyn's name of mairicari&folio, the species and synonomy are 

 so badly mixed up that very little importance can be attached to 

 them, and Braun's name, Botrychinm matricariivfolium, becomes 



♦Read before the New England riot. Club March 1, igoi. 



