172 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST 



mer .viul winter in the greenhouse and showed no sign of flow- 

 erin;,' though steadily increasing in size until the root reached 

 a diameter of Hve inches and the leaves were eighteen inches 

 long. Exposed to tlie full sunlight the following summer, it 

 promptly blossomed. This effect of different periods of light 

 is also held to account for certain phases of plant distribution. 

 Annuals, it is well known, are nearly absent from the tropics 

 since the short days there do not require plants to exhaust 

 their energies in seed production. Outside the tropics, how- 

 ever, the lengthened summer day may speed up the blooming 

 season with the result that the plants become annuals. 



Fringed Gentians. — Fringed gentians do not grow near 

 my home, so last fall a friend sent me a large boxful from 

 Massachusetts. The books say a plant of fringed gentian may 

 have as many as thirty of the showy flowers ; twenty was the 

 most on mine. They were all asleep when they arrived and in 

 spite of coaxing would never open of their own accord, thus 

 showing their relation to the bottle gentian. My fingers 

 spread the petals and their blueness and irregular fringe were 

 enjoyed. When discarding the bouc[uet two weeks later, a 

 stalk with a fragment of freshness and a bud was noticed. 

 This last stalk was kept in a vase of water near the radiator 

 where much heat is often felt and on the fourteenth of Octo- 

 ber without any help from me the corolla spread naturally and 

 was the only one that did so. The smallest and palest of all 

 and yet the one that behaved the best. For eleven days it 

 opened in the morning and closed in the evening and then 

 losing the power to move it stayed open all the time and not 

 until the first of November did the edges curl up and really 

 fade after nineteen days of life. It was frailer than those 

 that developed out of doors, but I wonder if they can boast 

 of so long a life. — Nell McMurray, Clearfield, Pa. 



