NEWS AND NOTES 399 



Belling the Cat. — "The experiment of putting a collar and bell 

 on a cat to prevent it from catching birds has been recommended 

 by many people who have never tried it and by some few who have, 

 but the most common experience seems to be that a cat which 

 is skillful enough to creep upon a bird, is expert enough to keep 

 the bell from ringing until the fina* spring. Belled cats catch 

 birds, rats and mice and all forms of wild life; although the bell 

 may save a few birds in some cases, it never saves helpless young. 

 Mr. Neil Morrow Ladd of Greenwich, Conn., records the fact that 

 a sleek, fat Angora cat, although burdened with six bells, brought 

 in during one nesting season 32 birds and in the next 28, none of 

 which it ate." 



News and Notes 



Distribution of Leaves in Sassafras 



The following note is made on the basis of examination of ten 

 sassafras trees and 102 seedlings near Pittsburgh, Pa., and eight 

 trees near St. Louis, Mo. But three kinds of leaves were met with 

 three-lobed, two-lobed and single-lobed, but it may be inferred 

 that the same laws will govern the distribution of the four-five- 

 and six-lobed forms described by Berry some years ago in the 

 Botanical Gazette. 



The single-lobed leaves are in great preponderance, constituting 

 two-thirds of the foliage in Pittsburgh specimens, while near 

 St. Louis, three trees were observed in which other than single- 

 lobed leaves were wanting. In these an extensive self-pruning 

 had taken place. The terminal leaves of young branches are 

 single-lobed, although there may be an occasional two-lobed leaf. 

 Tops of trees are usually composed almost entirely of single-lobed 

 leaves. 



The dissected forms of leaves appear to be most plentifully 

 developed under the influence of shade. In such cases they were 

 most thickly distributed" at the middle of the tree (as has been 

 noted for three-lobed leaves in the Britton and Brown Flora) ; 

 on young twigs whose terminal leaves were dissected, and toward 

 the bottom on older twigs. There was a tendency for more three- 

 lobed and less or.e-lobed leaves to be found on smaller twigs 

 growing rear the trunk, but occasionally on larger twigs, or smaller 

 boughs growing among the larger boughs. 



