THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 119 



over 3'our files and be sure they are complete. Do not 

 clela^^ and later pay a good price for what can now be had 

 free. Those subscribers who lack some of the earlier vol- 

 umes will some day regret it if they do not get them. 

 More than four hundred pages for less than two dollars is 

 less than you can buy the same amount of botanical liter- 

 ature for, elsewhere. 



* 



One of the evil results ot a neglect to become familiar 

 with what has been written upon one's specialty is found 

 in the re-discovery of previously known facts, if we may 

 so express it. By this we mean that an experimenter may 

 in all honesty announce as new, something that has been 

 worked out much earlier bj-- others, published in the mag- 

 azines and forgotten. To take a single example, the sleep 

 of Marsilia has been re-discovered in this way at least 

 three times. It Avould be an excellent thing if we could 

 have a botanical dictionary compiled from periodical liter- 

 ature, to which we could turn in case of uncertainty. The 

 present encyclopedias and dictionaries do not answer the 

 purpose for they onh^ treat of the main facts. What we 

 want is all the facts. In lieu of such a volume, an occa- 

 sional glance through the back volumes of standard bo- 

 tanical journals is ver3^ desirable, and is especially to be 

 recommended to becrinners. 



-e>* 



If any reader of this magazine is prevented from tak- 

 ing the customary vacation trip to the haunts of unfamil- 

 iar plants this summer let him not consider the season out 

 of joint. It is only the young plant collector or the ardent 

 species-maker that sighs for something new. Quite likely 

 the familiarity that breeds contempt has made hirh obliv- 

 ious to the beauties of vervain, and self heal and hardback 

 and St. John's-wort and Joe-Pye-weed. Let him see what 

 new virtues can be discerned in the common plants during 

 a leisurely saunter through the nearest country-side. 

 There is probably not one of us that fullj^ appreciates the 

 beauty ot the common flowers. 



