BOTANICAL GAZETTE. 177 



and was consequently growing rapidly. The day was excessively hot 

 and sultry, a thunder shower having passed hut a short time previously. 

 The discharge of pollen was so copious as to attract one's attention for 

 several rods. By examining the flower buds with a glass the tips of the 

 sepals could be seen to gradually spread apart, to be in two or three 

 minutes suddenly laid open by the straightening of the stamens. Usual- 

 ly two opposite stamens would straighten at the same time, though often 

 but one at a time. Frequently all four would pop out of their cramped 

 position at once. The anthers opened simultaneously with the libera- 

 tion of the stamens/and the pollen was thrown five or six inches. The 

 stamens straightened themselves to a perfectly horizontal position, the 

 filament usually twisting half or a quarter way round at the same time. 

 The stamens on a severed branch of the plant continued to open elasti- 

 cally for five or ten minutes. Subsequent observations after showers in 

 warm weather when the plant was growing vigorously often revealed 

 the pollen discharge, but in very much less quantity and vigor than in 

 the first case. The phenomenon could never be observed in Urtica 

 dioica. No doubt proper culture in a hot-house would discover our com- 

 mon nettle to be one of our most interesting plants, at least much more 

 so than the little Pilea ! — L. H. Bailey, Jr., Cambridge, Mass. 



C. S. Rafinesque. — The generally accepted impression that he was a 

 .Sicilian is probably incorrect. At least he tells us in his "Life and 

 Travels" "I was born at Galeta, near Constantinople, inhabited by Chris- 

 tian merchants and traders, my father being a French merchant of 

 Marseilles." 



In addition to Rafinesque's genera "in the region covered by Gray's 

 Manual," Pachystima may be added, discovered since the last edition of 

 the Manual appeared, though not the species on which the genus was 

 founded. 



When I was a young man in Philadelphia, thirty years ago, some of 

 Rafinesque's contemporaries were still living. His chief home was "here, 

 and here in a dingy garret, with scarcely a loaf of bread to eat, he 

 worked for science, as he understood it, to the last. He died on a cot 

 with hardly a rag to cover him, and without a solitary friend to stand by 

 him in his last hours. Bringhurst, a kind hearted undertaker, commit- 

 ted his body to the earth, and for years a pine board with "C. S. R." was 

 all that marked his last resting place. 



From all I have been able to learn from those who knew him, and 

 from what I have been able to gather from his writings, the summary 

 in the Gazette scarcely does him justice, though perhaps justified by 

 the statements heretofore published by those who had but imperfect 

 knowledge of the man. It can scarcely be said of him that "he pre- 

 ferred self to truth" in the common acceptance of these terms. He en- 

 dured rarely paralleled misfortunes, and sacrificed a large fortune for 

 the sake of science, and it is doubtful if what the world understands as 

 "truth" was ever sacrificed to anything by Rafinesque. His remarks on 



