19 
heretofore generally practised, a method more particularly de- 
scribed in the November and December Bulletins, is tedious and 
burdensome. Few, we think, will deny this. The collector who 
attempts to keep up with the season of flowers must have in use an 
immense quantity of paper—must rearrange specimens and paper 
at least twice a day—must thoroughly dry the sheets separately 
daily—all this besides the collecting makes botany a business rather 
— a recreation, and leaves too little time for study or any other 
y. 
It is the drying-press which is in fault—that old-fashioned press 
used by botanists from Linneus down. True, it has done good 
_ Service, and so has the sewing-needle. Shall the sewing-machine be 
rejected on this account? If the intolerable drudgery of plant- 
( g by absorption can be obviated by an invention, why not try 
it? Wood's wire-press, described in the “ Botanist and Florist,” 
p. 10, and “ Class-Book,” p. 15, is such an invention, unpatented, 
free to all collectors. It dries by evaporation rather than absorp- 
tion, and thus makes available all the sources of heat, whether nat+. 
ural or artificial. It requires comparatively but little paper—less 
than half the amount needed in the old process ; hence it is port- 
able, and serves the double purpose of portfolio and press. It re- 
quires no changing of specimens and papers, no drying of damp 
and mildewed: sheets. 
: fair weather the wire press dries in the wind and sunshine ; 
im foul weather, by the fire. In either case, after one or two days 
€ specimens will be found thoroughly cured, and 2s bright in 
colors as ig possible by any other known method. 
_, Lo the travelling collector this form of press is invaluable. With 
it so light is his labor in drying his specimens that it occasions 
him little if any delay, and so light his luggage that a single don- 
€y will suffice him in lieu of half a dozen for its transportation. 
ith this simple press the writer, during a single year, cured more 
than three thousand specimens, in a protracted journey of about 
fteen hundred miles. A, We 
19, Drop-Rottle. See the Figure in the last No—I have the jet, C, 
ed obliquely upwards; the air-tube, A, turned downwards ; 
and at the other end of the jet, D, a small bell made in the tube to 
old a wisp of cotton for a much needed strainer. D: GE. 
20, Marsilia quadrifolia, L.—I have from Florida a Marsilia so le- 
lled, but it is more likely to be one of the western species, J/. 
Uncinata, Braun, for instance. D. 0. -E: 
21, Euphorbia Helioseopia, L.—Abounds near the river bank, and 
ther back across the river, opposite to the Main Street dock, 
P oughkeepsie, I have never seen it nearer to New York City. — 
%. Cryptogam : Th TF vecpher. of the 
. ie Publications —We have received The Erysiphet of the 
_ United States, by M. C. Cooke, M.A., and C. H. Peck, reprinted from 
the Journal of Botany, for January, 1872.—Also a prospectus of 
Grevillea, a Monthly Record of Cryptogamic Botany, with Illustrations, 
