251 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 
thirty miles west of St. Louis. Here Mr. pegs taught in the public 
schools sere tad oe twenty years, and then for two years served as 
superintendent of schools in St. Louis County. Shortly Pitas settling in Allen- 
ton Mr. Letterman met amt Fendler, the botanist, who had a farm at this 
time in the n zaahhor orhood. This meeting with Fendler ne his interest 
in jeeae especially in trees, and led to an acqua epee ith Dr. Engelmann, 
for w etterman made large collections of plants in the ela bachaod of 
perc with many al on the oaks and hickories. er 1880 he was appointed 
a special agent of the Census Department of the United States, to collect infor- 
a 
and eastern Texas, and later he was employed as an agent of the American 
Museum of Natural History in New York, to collect specimens of the trees of 
the same re _ m for the Jesup collection of North American woods. The dis- 
tribution of the trees of this region before Mr. Letterman’s travels was little 
wn, and much useful information concerning them was first gathered by 
him. Of his numerous discoveries species of Vernonia, Poa and Stipa commem- 
orate the name of Letterman. 
The above account is taken verbatim from Sargent’s “Silva of 
North America,” as it is the only authentic account of Mr. Letterman’s 
life available. Mr. Letterman still lives at Allenton, Missouri, and is 
carrying on his botanical work.. From the accounts of those in a posi- 
tion to know, his herbarium is very large, and at the present time prob- 
ably contains as complete a representation of the St. Louis flora as any 
other, with the possible exception of the Eggert collection, which, 
owever, can hardly surpass it. Mr. Letterman is connected with the 
local botanical societies, and is well known by the botanical workers 
of the city. 
One man who has left an enduring impression upon botany, al- 
though his life work was along other lines, was Dr. Charles Valentine 
Riley.”* Dr. Riley was born at Chelsea, London, September 18, 1843. 
His boyhood was spent at Walton-on-Thames, where he became ac- 
quainted with W. C. Hewitson, the author of a work on butterflies. 
This acquaintance undoubtedly turned his inclinations towards ento- 
mology. He studied for three years in the school at Dieppe and after- 
wards at Bonn. His teacher at the latter place urged him to study art 
at Paris, but this was not done. At the age of seventeen he emigrated 
to Illinois and when about twenty-one went to Chicago as reporter and 
editor for the Prairie Farmer. He was for six months in an Illinois 
regiment during the latter part of the Rebellion. He attained such 
success as an entomologist that he was made State Entomologist for 
Missouri in 1868, and he held this office until 1877, when he went to 
Washington in the government service. During this period he and his 
assistants, Miss Mary E. Murtfeldt and Mr. Otto Lugger, worked out 
two cases of the relation of insects to plants which are of more than 
ordinary interest. 
In 1863 there were first noted in France the ravages of the Ameri- 
= Howard, L. 0., Proce, Soc. Prom. Agric. Sci., 17: 108-112, 1896. 
