46 PALMER : RARE LOCAL FERNS. 



afar requests for specimens, and from near at hand demands 

 for specific descriptions of the location. One therefore hesi- 

 tates to be quite frank about the matter, and comes at last to 

 appreciate the origin of the mysterious, impenetrable cloud 

 that has settled over the " limestone cliffs near Philadelphia," 

 and rested there these many years. For, hybrid or no hybrid, 

 the three plants in Chester Valley, if the writer and his friends 

 have their desire, shall remain there unvexed of the collector, 

 with every opportunity that Nature permits them to work out 

 their own destiny. There, in the sequestered nook where they 

 were hidden by the great, impersonal mother, let them do, 

 unmolested of mankind, what is possible to them. Let the 

 trees that shade them still keep silence and let the stream still 

 ignore them in its prattle. If they survive, well and good. 

 If they succumb, " well also, though not so well." 



MINUTES OF MEETINGS. 

 September 6, 1906. — Regular monthly meeting of the 

 Institute. Reports of Curators and Committees. On motion 

 the repairs to the roof of the building, done under the direc- 

 tion of the Board of Curators, were approved, and the bill 

 directed to be paid. The Publication Committee reported the 

 completion of Volume I of The Proceedings ' and was 

 awarded an appropriation of one hundred dollars. Plans for 

 the proposed improvement to the entrance to the building 

 were submitted by the tenant. The Media Title and Trust 

 Company, and the matter referred to the Board of Curators. 

 The following additions to the Library were reported : " Pro- 

 ceedings of the United States Museum, 1906 ; " " Browning's 

 Complete Poetical Works." Charles Potts exhibited some 

 specimens of live tortoise beetles, which had the faculty of 

 changing color. The matter was discussed at length. Lewis 

 Kirk called attention to some unusual relations to be met 

 with in the geometrical figure used to demonstrate Euclid's 

 famous " Forty-seventh Proposition." Adjourned. 



