Letters Received from Absent Friends. 29 



seventy-five varieties of Russian and German apjjles and many other things, and 

 it will not be long before I shall be able to give you some facts. I am really sorry 

 I can not be with you. Yours, truly, Chas. Gibb. 



No more valuable scientific papers have ever been presented to 

 this Society than those published in volumes I and II of its trans- 

 actions on " Insects Affecting the Strawberry," from the pen of that 

 greatest of American entomolgists, Prof. Forbes. His well recog- 

 nized ability has won for him such numerous and pressing engage- 

 ments that it seems he can only find time nowadays to briefly ex- 

 press his regrets for enforced absence : 



Champaign, III., December 19, 1887. 

 Mr. Parker Earle, President American Horticultural Society: 



Dear Sir — Your programme of travel and your subject for an address are 

 both particularly inviting, and I wish that it were in any way possible for me to 

 accept your very cordial invitation. While I suppose I could take the bit in my 

 teeth and run away, yet if I pay any attention whatever to my duties and engage- 

 ments it is absolutely impossible for me to leave. I am down for farmers' insti- 

 tutes enough to keep me almost continuously busy during the period of the pro- 

 posed trip, to say nothing of the university work and the necessary entomological 

 and zoological writing on the reports of the office. I have also agreed to give 

 some outside lectures, which will further prevent my absenting myself at that 

 time. The thing I most regret is my inability to meet your wi»hes in the matter, 

 and if it were anything less than absolute inability, I would do what you wish 

 without question. Very truly yours, S. A. Forbes. 



Here is a short letter from one of our greatest lights. No per- 

 son who reads that best of all rural papers, the Rural New Yorker, 

 will lightly value even a "short" letter from its able editor. E. 

 S. Carman embodies the very essence of sincerity in his letter of 

 regrets : 



Dear Parker Earle : Thank you very much for your kind letter. I wish 

 you knew how much I would like to go with you, and how entirely impossible it is 

 for me to do it. Best wishes. E. S. Carman. 



Rev. E. P. Roe, widely known to fame as an author, is none 

 the less an horticulturist. Some of his most charming productions 

 have been in the line of horticultural literature. Nor is this all. 

 There is in this line of work something more than the mere embel- 

 lishments acquired in the field of horticultural literature. Brother 

 Roe is, withal, a practical horticulturist: 



