SKETCH OF MOSES ASHLEY CURTIS. 409 



mons as the ' Woody Plants/ This volume, of one hundred and 

 twenty-four pages, was printed by the State in 18G0, and at once 

 became a popular manual for the farmer and the woodsman, and 

 for amateur botanists a key to the more conspicuous trees and 

 shrubs useful for their fruit or timber or as ornaments. The key 

 devised to enable one of no botanical knowledge to determine a 

 given plant or shrub was founded upon the character of the fruit 

 and distinguished by the common name. The preface of this 

 little work is an introduction to the geographical distribution of 

 plants in the State, and shows what a thorough acquaintance he 

 had with the vast subject." The essay made prominent the ex- 

 ceptional position which North Carolina holds in respect to cli- 

 mate, soil, and forest products, by calling attention to the exist- 

 ence of a difference in elevation between the eastern and western 

 parts, which gives a difference of climate equivalent to ten or 

 twelve degrees of latitude. The work displays an accurate knowl- 

 edge of common names, with all the local changes which they un- 

 dergo. It has been liberally drawn from by subsequent writers, 

 not always with due acknowledgment. In "A Commentary on 

 the Natural History of Dr. Hawks's ' History of North Carolina,' " 

 published in the "University Magazine" in 1860, Dr. Curtis 

 corrected many errors into which the author had fallen by 

 accepting the exaggerated and too highly colored accounts of the 

 old travelers and ex^Dlorers concerning the plant-growth of the 

 State. 



Dr. Curtis's " Catalogue of the Indigenous and Naturalized 

 Plants " of North Carolina was published by the State in 18G7 as 

 a jDart of the Geological and Natural History Survey. At the 

 time of its issue the author asserted that, comprising forty-eight 

 hundred species, it was the most extensive local list of plants ever 

 published in North America. It is claimed to have been the first 

 attempt to enumerate the cryptogamous as well as the phenoga- 

 mous plants ever made by any botanist in this country. It con- 

 sisted of one hundred and fifty-eight pages of catalogue, with no 

 scientific description, but a mere statement of the locality of each 

 plant, and was the result of twenty-five years of botanical study 

 over a territory of fifty thousand square miles. Pathological 

 mycology had only begun to be studied in Dr. Curtis's lifetime. 

 An incident related by Dr. Wood suggests that, had he engaged in 

 this branch of investigation, he might have become a master of 

 the subject. A group of doctors were examining some figures of 

 microscopic fungi in Beale's " Microscope in Practical Medicine," 

 and particularly the O'idium albicans, which was supposed to be 

 a cause of thrush. Dr. Curtis coming in, at once recognized a 

 very familiar fungus, and, showing that the spores could only 

 find lodgment when the soil was prepared to receive them, cau- 



