Vol. I11,, No. 8.) BULLETIN OF THE TORREY BOTANICAL CLUB, | New York, August, 1872, 
63. Note from Dr. Engelmann.--Your July Butzerry is just received. 
Did I write so indistinctly that you could have made out the gluti- 
nous pollen gelatinows? Who ever has seen gelatinous pollen? 
Of minor importance, is that you made me refer the moth in 
question to the Genus Tortriz. I undoubtedly said “allied to Tor- 
trix. Our State Entomologist, Prof. Riley, has examined the moth, 
and found it to belong to Tineide, and to constitute a new and 
distinct genus. The same is found wherever capsule-bearing Yuc- 
cas grow. The larva lives on the growing seeds, fertilized by the 
exertions of its mother, bores through the yet green rind of the 
full grown fruit, and enters the ground. I have received it now 
from South Carolina, whence Dr. John K, Mellichamp, the discoverer 
of Pinus Elliotti, sends it; and from Texas, where Mr. Elihu Hall 
has found it. Dr. Mellichamp has won laurels in the zealous in- 
vestigation of the flora of his region, and has furnished me, in the 
most amiable manner, valuable material and notes for my botani- 
cal studies, especially as far as regards Conifers and Yuccas. 
_ Searcely any Yucca capsule is seen without one or more holes in 
it made by the escaping larve, and part and sometimes all of the 
seeds are sacrificed to obtain the fertilization of the ovules. 
Your notice of the Agave has made me think of your letter. : 
had mislaid and forgotten it. I should like éo obtain, if yet time, 
a bunch of flowers, fresh, sent by mail in a box. 
You will observe a fact, interesting in many points, in the flowers 
and fertilization of Agave. When theflowers open and the anthers 
shed their pollen, the style is yet quite short, often hidden within 
the flowers, and the stigma closed. Only the following day, after 
the anthers are effete, or have even fallen off, the style lengthens 
and usually attains the height of the filaments, when the three lobes 
of the stigma expand, ready to receive the pollen of the younger 
flowers opening now above them. Agave is, therefore, proteran- 
tous ; descriptions mentioning the length of the style must be 
cautiously considered ; and figures which represent style and 
stamen equally developed are necessarily erroneous. 
I wish I could obtain a bunch of flowers, and regret much, not 
having written at ones. Capsules and seeds will also be acceptable. 
Sr. Louis, July 29th, 1872. 
[When we received Dr. E.’s letter it was too late for the Agave. We publish 
his request in hopes that some one else may be able to respond. —Eps. } 
64. Yueea.—In Dr. George Engelmann’s notes on the fertilization 
of the Yuccas, in July Buuveriy, he says : “ The fruit and seed are 
rare ; indeed, almost unknown in cultivation in Northern gardens;” 
and also, “ Without artificial aid, the pollen never reaches the inner 
or stigmatic surface of the tube, ke.” 
_ In my own garden, the Y. ji/amentosa, Gray, bloomsand matures 
its seed annually. I have never been able to discover the interven- 
tion of any insect to assist fertilization, nor have I ever failed to 
“teed the prompt germination of seed taken from oy we 
