Botanical Gazette. 



Vol. VI. SEPTEMBER, 1881. No. 9. 



Editorijll. — Dr. Asa Gray will return to this country during 

 the first weeks of September. He is heartily welcomed home by all 

 botanists, few of whom have not reason to thank him for repeated 

 favors. 



Dr. Geo. L. Goodale has earned a year's relief from class work. 

 He sailed September 3 for Germany where he will try to find much 

 needed rest. The burden of a popular professorship, an extensive 

 botanical garden, and other university duties is heavy enough at best; 

 but add to all this repeated sickness at home and it will tax ihe strength 

 of the strongest. 



Erratum. In Mr. Lennon's article on page 248 of the last Ga- 

 zette, Hic7-aciinn aurantium should read H. aiirantiacuvi. 



Dr. Fritz Muller has discovered in Brazil two kinds of stamens 

 of different function in the same flower. The plant is a species of 

 Heeria {Melastomacece) and the two sets of stamens are distinguished 

 by short filaments with yellow anthers, and long filaments with red 

 anthers, the color of the petals. The parts are so arranged that an 

 insect plundering the conspicuous yellow anthers will have its body 

 well dusted with the pollen of the other set. 



M. Storbzl assures us that the slow immersion of a fresh plant in 

 a boiling solution of one part of salicylic acid in 600 parts of alcohol, 

 and then shaking off superfluous moisture, previous to pressing in the 

 usual way between blotting paper, will more nearly preserve the 

 natural color than any other method. 



Mr. H. W. Ravenel in the August Torrey Bulletin describes the 

 peculiar habit observed in Asclepias amplexicaulis. It is a case of ap- 

 parently one-ranked leaves, caused by the stems assuming a recumb- 

 ent position and twisting alternately from right to left and from left to 

 right. In this way both surfaces of the leaf are exposed alike to the 

 sun. 



Mr. W. H. Leggett in the September number of the same 

 periodical has a most interesting note on the "Fertilization of Rhexia 

 VbginicaP The minute pore found in the anthers hasoften been thought 

 of insufficient capacity to provide an escape for the pollen. Mr. 

 Leggett finds that the inflated sacks at the base of the anthers act as 

 bellows and that when a bee treads upon them they yield to the pres- 



