THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 15 



New Use for Fern Rhizomes. — After trying various 

 compositions for potting orchids, growers have settled 

 upon "osmunda root fibre" as the best material for the 

 purpose. This is made from the rootstocks of the cinna- 

 mon fern {Osmunda cinnamomea) and the royal fern (O. 

 regalis). It is said to be almost indestructable and to 

 form a sweet and healthy rooting medium. It may be 

 noted in this connection that in the tropics sections of tree 

 fern trunks, which are comparable to the Osmunda root- 

 stock, are commonly used for the same purpose. 



Origin of a Violet-berry. — One of the foremost of the 

 violet species makers has been caught napping. He des- 

 cribes a structure in V. Dicksonii which he assumes to be 

 the underground fruit "converted into a berr3^ It is evi- 

 dentl3^ globose (as large as an ordinary w^ild gooseberry 

 or middle-sized pea) absolutely indehiscent, the pressed 

 and dried pericarp being unbroken, translucent and show^- 

 ing the seeds that lie within, just as, in the herbarium, the 

 seeds of many a berrv-like fruit are seen through their 

 fleshy covering in its dried state." Now Air. Ezra Brain- 

 erd demolishes this interesting story by showing that the 

 *'berry" is due simply to the sting of a gall-fly and that 

 similar structures are found in at least four other species. 



A Tree Morning Glory. — The committee that inves- 

 tigated various parts of the Southwest previous to the 

 establishment there of a desert botanical Laboratory of 

 the Carnagie Institution report that in certain parts the 

 tree morning glory (Ipomea arhorescens) was common. 

 It is described as follows : "The morning glory is a tree 20 

 to 30 feet high, with smooth chalky gray trunk and 

 branches, leafless at this season [January] throughout, its 

 large white flowers opening one by one on the ends of the 

 naked br^inches. From its white bark the tree is some- 

 times known as palo bianco, and from the gum or resin 

 which exudes from incisions made in it for the purpose and 

 which is used as incense in religious ceremonies it is called 

 also palo santo." 



