122 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 



so hard as nearly to exclude water. For class use they must be 

 boiled for ten minutes or more to soften and swell them. If 

 one prefers to purchase the seeds they may be obtained of most 



seedsmen, but it is easy to collect a supply that will last for 

 years. 



Making a Botany Teacher. — Commenting on the fact 

 that botany in the high school is usually entrusted to the teacher 

 who has the least to do, a professor in a well known university 

 writes as follows : "I have had some remarkable examples 

 called to my attention of just what you mention, namely the 

 assignment of botany to anybody. A few years ago a gradu- 

 ate of this University, a young woman of marked ability, who 

 had studied absolutely no botany whatever, and who was ap- 

 pointed a teacher in one of the high schools of the state, came 

 to me in great distress in August after the close of the Univer- 

 sity Summer School saying that she had been informed that she 

 must take botany as one of the subjects that she should teach. 

 She protested saying that she had applied as a teacher of Eng- 

 lish literature, history, etc., and that she knew nothing about 

 botany. Her protest was passed over as of no value and she 

 was informed that she must either give up the position or teach 

 the botany. Now what do you think of that? The young 

 woman had the good sense to see that she could not teach 

 botany without knowing something about it. She came to me 

 and I gave her a place in my laboratory during the rest of the 

 vacation and gave her all the help that I could. Being a young 

 woman of much abiliy she mastered the essentials of the sub- 

 ject to such a degree that she became one of the best teachers of 

 botany in the high schools. But this was an exceptional case 

 She has ever since then felt indignation against the school au- 

 thorities that compelled her to do this and yet with this has been 

 the feeling of pleasure that after all it brought her into a sub- 

 ject that she liked very much. She is not teaching now, but 

 has gone into medical practice, but the case is interesting and 

 quite to the point." 



