TWENTY-FIFTH ANNUAL MEETING. 69 



As is always the ease with men of such strong will as he possessed, he was not al- 

 ways understood, his marked peculiarities often concealing his real worth. Beneath 

 his exterior, so often brusque, he had a kind heart. Especially was he averse to all 

 ceremony and pretension, and singularly opposed to anything which tended to make 

 him personally prominent. 



His last illness was long and painful, though undergone without complaint; he 

 only wished for death. Almost the last words, found among his papers, were the 

 following: "I have passed a pleasant day, and the night has overtaken me by the 

 wayside. Let me rest in its kind enfoldments." 



ON THE IMPROVEMENT OF S0RaHU3r BY SEED SELECTION. 



BY G. H. FAILYEB AND J. T. WILLAED, STATE AGEICULTURAL COLLEGE. 



The experiments reported upon are those conducted by the chemical department 

 of the Agricultural College Experiment Station. The full accounts of this work, 

 which extends over five years, may be found in the reports and bulletins of the sta- 

 tion. The work may be briefly outlined, as follows: 



1. The object of the experiment is to improve our best varieties of sorghum by 

 propagating only from the best stalks. 



2. Which are the best stalks is determined in the only way possible, viz., by anal- 

 ysis of the juice of single stalks. In this way the most superior seed tops from 

 among several hundred single plants can be selected. 



3. Seed from the best seed tops so obtained is planted the next year, and selec- 

 tions are again made as before, and so on year after year. 



4. A large, but gradual, increase in sugar content has been observed during the 

 five years that the experiment has been in progress. Part of this improvement may 

 be due to acclimatization, but the writers think that no reasonable doubt can be 

 entertained that the seed selection has been a very important factor in the improve- 

 ment. 



A VARIETY OF AMPELOPSIS QUINQUEFOLIA. 



BY E. B. KNEER, ATCHISON. 



So far as I have been able to ascertain, the botanies fail to notice and describe a 

 variety of the Virginia creeper, Ampelopsis quinquefolia Michx., in which character- 

 istic points of difference from the typical species are quite marked. 



In the first place, the habit of growth is quite different. As is commonly known, 

 the true species climbs by clinging very closely to its support, whether that be a tree 

 or a wall. The variety does not cling so closely to its support; in fact, it is impos- 

 sible for it to climb a wall or a tree trunk, unless the bark of the tree be very rough, 

 owing to the structure of its tendrils. It climbs rather like the grape and the clem- 

 atis, by trailing over low shrubbery to that which is higher, until it may reach the 

 lower branches of a tree, when it may rise to a considerable height by reaching from 

 branch to branch, rather than by clinging close to the body of the tree and larger 

 branches. Sometimes, in transplanting the Virginia creeper, this variety is hit upon, 

 and people wonder why it fails to cling to the side of the house. If the tendrils be 

 examined, they will be found to be more like grape tendrils, long, curling, and grasp- 

 ing by recurved tips, rather than short, digitate, and clinging by disk-like expan- 



