ST. JOHN: SABLE ISLAND. 85 
fhe observations of both these explorers apparently the only member 
of the genus on the island. The plant in habit, outline of foliage, and 
large flowers, as well as in the characters of its calyx and seeds, ex- 
actly matches the common E. molle Torr. of the mainland, while the 
capsules have the peculiar glandular pubescence which is found upon 
the capsules of E. molle, but in the Sable Island plant much more 
highly developed than is common in mainland specimens. The 
stems and the leaves of the Sable Island plant, however, are 
densely cinereous with appressed and incurved hairs, exactly as 
in E. densum Raf. ; E. viollc having the stems, leaves, etc., densely 
covered with fine, straight conspicuously spreading pubescence. 
"This Sable Island plant with the technical characters of calyx, pet- 
als, etc., and the glandular pubescence of the capsule, and the exact 
habit and leaf-outline of E. mollr, but with the pubescence of the 
leaves and stems exactly as in E. drnsum would, if found upon the main- 
land, be promptly called a hybrid between those two species. But 
neither of the species has been detected on Sable Island, a region of 
sufficiently limited area to give assurance that the extended explor- 
ations of Macoun in 1899, of Giissow in 1911, and of St. John in 1913, 
when the latter explorer spent four weeks in an intensive study of the 
flora, would have brought to light any other existing member of the 
genus. Upon Sable Island, then, this plant, combining the characters 
of two ordinarily distinct species of the mainland, cannot be accepted 
as a hybrid, at least of modern origin. There is, moreover, reason to 
believe that the flora of Sable Island rcaciied that area during the 
late Pleistocene and has been isolated from tlu- mainland flora since 
that time. However long this period may have been, whether es- 
timated by thousands or tens of thousands of years, it has certainly 
been a sufficient time for the Sable Island plant to have become thor- 
oughly fixed in its characters, and even if, many thousands of years 
ago, it may have originated as a hybrid, it has upon Sable Island in- 
tensified its characters and become a thoroughly constant plant. 
"The case of this plant is exactly comparal)le with that of /'^ (/(V(.s»»j, 
var. ursophiliuH * * * the pcH'iiliar variant of E.dni.'finn found upon Xew- 
foiiiKlIiind and the Magdalen Islands, wIum-c no true E. drusinii is 
found, hut in tliose areas suggesting tliat it might have originated in 
the long-distant past l)y the hybridization of E. din.'^uiii of the Si>uth 
and E. jxdustrc of (be Nortii. W liether these plants liaxc bad sueb 
an origin is entirely probleinutieal and it in;iy as eonli<leiUly be argued 
