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elliptical, smooth margin, ciliated. Syme describes the stem 
as erect, Babington as 1-3 feet high. I have never seen 
living specimens, but in dead ones which I possess there 
seem to be, as in P. minus, very minute glands at the base 
of the ochrese and perianths. After careful comparison of 
the ochrese of this species and P. minus I can find no differ- 
ence to be relied on. 
Syme in English Botany quotes without any expression 
of doubt Polyg. dubium, Stein, as a synonym of P. mite, and 
refers to Gren. and Godron. P. dubium, Stein, seems to me 
to be a well marked variety or sub-species, differing from P . 
mite in its longer, denser, and pendulous spike, and lanceo- 
late leaves. Its aspect is that of P. Hydropiper, which 
species however is at once separated from all its allies by 
the presence of numerous large and conspicuous glands on 
the perianth. 
Grenier and Godron on the other hand quote Polygonum 
mite, Schrank, as a synon ym of a hybrid plant, viz., P. Hydro- 
piperi — dubium G. and G., and add to this hybrid as another 
synonym P. hydropiperoides, Mich., FI. Am. boreal. P.hydro- 
piperoides, Mich., is described by Dr. Asa Gray in his Manual 
of Botany of United States as “ common, especially south, 
ward,” and he adds as a synonym to this plant, “ P. mite, 
Persoon, not of Schrank,” and of the two plants supposed by 
G. and G. to be parents to this, one, viz., P. Hydropiper, is 
marked in Gray’s U. S. Flora as “Naturalized from Europe,” 
and the other parent, viz., P. dubium, Stein, is altogether 
absent. P. hydropiperoides is nearly related to P. mite, 
Schrank, but is distinguished by its rough or appressed 
pubescent leaves. 
Polygonum Persicaria, L. is in all the specimens I have 
seen readily separated from P. mite by its shorter, dense, 
oblong, uninterrupted spikes; leaves roughish with sparing 
appressed pubescence ; shorter, wider, and more strongly 
fringed ochrese, and the nuts as pitchy black, smooth and 
shining as those of P. minus ; in size and form however the 
nuts exactly resemble those of P. mite. 
Accompanying, for sake of comparison, are tracings of 
