Notes and Comment. 77 



parents. For circumstance is but Emerson's synonym for the 

 evolutionist's word environment; and environment, on analysis, 

 proves to be the sum of the formative influences." 



The last word on evolution from Prof. T. H. Morgan is al- 

 ways worth pondering even if it is in some degree discouraging. 

 In his presidential address before the American Society of Natur- 

 alists in Convocation Week at Boston we find these words which 

 make one wish that other writers on this subject had been equally 

 explicit as to their conception of evolution and the means of its 

 demonstration : 



"The position of the naturalist in regard to the causes of 

 evolution is far from satisfactory and most unsatisfactory con- 

 cerning the origin and evolution of adaptation Our 



problem concerns the adaptations of species, and from this time 

 forward when I speak of the origin of species I mean the origin 



of the adaptive characters of species The time is 



past when it will be any longer possible to speculate light-hearted- 

 ly about the possibilities of evolution, for an army of capable and 

 acute investigators is carefully weighing by experimental tests 

 the evidence on which all theories of evolution and adaptation 

 must rest. To them belongs the future." 



The last list of publications in the Field of Botanical Science 

 issued by the Carnegie Institution of Washington includes 19 

 numbers (20 separate papers) bearing dates from 1903 to 1909. 

 These represent a relatively small part of the publications of the 

 botanical specialists of the Institution within the period in- 

 dicated. One reason, doubtless, is the expense that under the 

 present system must be incurred by authors who distribute more 

 than ten copies of their papers. These are sent out at actual 

 cost of publication, but even at this investigators of limited 

 means have found it necessary to publish much of their work 

 elsewhere. 



A study on the heredity and life-history of the trichomes 

 in species and hybrids of Juglans, Oenothera, Papaver and 

 Solanum, by W. A. Cannon, has lately been put out by the Carne- 

 gie Institution of Washington. The research was largely con- 

 fined to examination of glandular hairs, and among the conclu- 



