20 THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 



suited to it. The tendency of all land areas is toward one of 

 the other of two formations, — grassland or woodland. It 

 is not a mere matter of chance whicli it shall be. A meadow 

 in many parts of the Eastern States would not forever remain 

 meadow if untouched by man. Slowly one tree after another 

 would come in and at length it would become forest again as 

 it was when man took up his residence in the region. On the 

 contrary, the prairies of the Middle West would probably 

 always be grass-land. Man, himself, finds it difficult to keep 

 trees growing upon them. Such forests as are planted do 

 not tend to reproduce themselves. It is a region in which 

 grass is to be supreme. 



Origin of the Name Linnaeus. — The world having re- 

 cently celebrated the two hundredth anniversary of the birth 

 of the great Swedish botanist it is interesting to record the 

 oriein of the familv name. It is well known that the Swedish 

 people in general ha\e no family names, the son of Sven 

 Carlson being known as Ingemar Svenson and the latter's 

 son as Carl Ingemarson. When anyone rose above the mere 

 peasant class it was usual for him to select a new family name 

 and in this way Nils Ingemarson, the father of the botanist, 

 when he entered the "gymnasium" took the name of Nils 

 Linnaeus from a celebrated linden tree {Tilia Europaca) in 

 the vicinity. This linden tree was very okl and large^and was 

 regarded as a holy tree by tlie peasants. Before Linnaeus 

 was born, two uncles, brothers of his grandmother had also 

 taken a family name from this same tree, chilling themselves 

 Tiliander, froiu the Latin for linden and the Greek ^or man. 

 Still another branch of the family called themscives i indelius. 

 thus i]:e tree !)■ -re ?t least three family namc'^ as well as its 

 own fruit. The origin of the word, linden, is ecjually interest- 

 ino-. Tilt Latin word for flax is Uuuui and th.e word tor thread 

 spun fiom liiiin-1 was naturally liiu\ The thread- like inner 



