Z5 
tice that such a garden has by no means become outmoded and 
would be a valuable addition to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. A 
Medicinal Plant Garden has been a part of our plans from the 
beginning, and a start was made toward planting it in the early 
years. For a number of reasons, those early plans could not be 
carried through to completion. 
In the spring of 1935, it was decided to utilize some of the WPA 
labor that became available to prepare an area north of the Japanese 
Garden for development as a garden of medicinal plants and 
culinary “herbs.” Plans prepared by our landscape architect, Mr. 
Caparn, have progressed throughout the year, and may be carried 
to completion in the spring of 1936. 
The Japanese Garden.—Through lack of funds it was possible 
to command the services of the Japanese gardener, under Miss 
Averill’s direction, for only two weeks in 1935, and the work has 
had to be confined to the most urgent items of routine maintenance. 
Anthophyllite Boulder—During 1934 the surface of the vacant 
lot on the east side of Washington Avenue, between Carroll and 
President Streets, was brought down to the approximate level of 
the sidewalks by removing the morainal deposit of sand, gravel, 
and boulders, which formed an uneven surface rising in places as 
much as ten feet above the street level. One of the large boulders, 
measuring 6 ft. high by 8 ft. 8 in. wide, had such an interesting 
surface that we brought it into the Garden (with WPA labor) 
and placed it on the south side of the walk just inside the north 
Washington Avenue gate. In the spring of 1935, Prof. Robert 
Balk, of Hunter College, determined that the boulder was a mass 
of anthophyllite, a variety of the mineral hornblende (amphibole 
group). The name refers to the character of the crystals, which 
form radiating groups, resembling the flowers of the Compositae. 
—_— 
These masses commonly form around masses of serpentine or 
similar rocks rich in magnesia, due to the action of hot solution, 
following the intrusion of serpentine magmas. 
This boulder, like all the others in the Botanic Garden, was 
transported to this region by the continental glacier during the 
Ice Age. According to information supplied by Dr. D. H. New- 
land, New York State Geologist, “ The boulder may have come 
from around New Rochelle or Port Chester where the mineral 
anthophyllite is known to occur, or it may have come from farther 
