458 proceedings: botanical society 



father was a Harvard graduate. Captain Wyeth received a business 

 training, was one of the pioneers in the ice business, and an inventor of 

 ice-cutting tools. Brought up in Cambridge, he seems to have taken 

 advantage of his environment, as his letters and journals evidence. His 

 interest in nature was fostered through friendship with Professor Thomas 

 Nuttall of the Harvard Botanic Garden. 



Through propaganda for the American colonization of Oregon, 

 Wyeth's patriotic enthusiasm became so aroused that he joined the 

 movement, but disagreeing with the leadership he organized the Pacific 

 Trading Company, which started for Oregon in 1832 and after many 

 discouragements reached Fort Vancouver, Washington, and disbanded. 



The following spring Captain Wyeth accompanied the Hudson Bay 

 Brigade to Camas Creek, Idaho, returning home with the Rocky Moun- 

 tain Fur Company Brigade down the Yellowstone and the Missouri. 

 On this spring trip Wyeth collected many new plants, from whichThomas 

 Nuttall described two genera and fifty-four species. Captain Wyeth 

 acquired such an interest in the country that he immediately planned a 

 larger expedition. His friend Nuttall was induced to join. A stock 

 compan}^, the Columbia River Fishing and Trading Company was 

 organized and an expedition of seventy men set out in the spring of 1834. 



Financially this company failed and Wyeth closed the business, re- 

 turning home in 1836. However, Captain Wyeth's second expedition 

 took the first permanent American settlers to Oregon and blazed the 

 trail for the great exodus to Oregon ten years later. As the result of this 

 expedition J. K. Townsend collected and described many birds and 

 animals. Nuttall described about eighty genera and seven hundred and 

 fifty species of American plants. 



V. K. Chesnut: Papain from Carica Papaya grown in Florida. 

 Genuine papain of good quality is so rare a product in commerce that the 

 trade, and even most chemists, have been unable to learn its eminent 

 worth as a protein digestant, especially from the manufacturing stand- 

 point. Inability to control the product was thought to be due to a lack 

 of knowledge of the ferment as well as to the need of a method of assay 

 which would exclude pepsin and other enzymes which have been, or may 

 be, used as adulterants. Forty-eight samples representing the latex from 

 every variety and condition of fruit available at the Foreign Seed and 

 Plant Introduction Field Station at Miami were collected by the author 

 and twenty other genuine samples were secured from Honolulu and else- 

 where. These were subjected to extended investigation and it was found 

 that the optimal H- ion concentration and field of activity were identical 

 in the case of all the specimens. A method of examination was finally 

 arrived at which enabled the author not only to determine the compara- 

 tive strength of a commercial sample, but at the same time, to detect the 

 presence of pepsin or other enzymic adulterants. Much of the value of 

 the latex depends upon the stage of ripeness of the fruit and especially 

 the methods used for drying and conservation. Since only 10 mg. are 

 required for an assay, it is now possible for an investigator to study the 

 fruit with a view toward the selection of the varieties best suited for the 



