MYRTACEZ. 
SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. 
33 
annual growth. The specific gravity of the absolutely dry wood is 0.8983, a cubic foot weighing 55.97 
pounds. 
Anamomis dichotoma was probably first distinguished! by the Danish botanist Vahl ;°* in Florida 
it was discovered on Key West by Dr. J. L. Blodgett. 
1 See Poiret, Zam. Dict. Suppl. iv. 54. The flowers of Vahl’s 
plant were, however, described as five-parted. 
2 Martin Vahl (1749-1804) was born at Bergen in Norway and 
pursued his scientific studies at Copenhagen and afterwards at 
Upsal, where he became a favorite pupil of Linneus. In 1779 
Vahl was appointed lecturer in the Botanic Garden at Copenhagen, 
and having filled this position during three years was sent by the 
King of Denmark on a scientific voyage of observation, during 
which he traveled extensively in Holland, France, Italy, Spain, 
northern Africa, Switzerland, and England. Returning to Copen- 
hagen in 1785, he was appointed professor of natural history in the 
University of that city and was intrusted with the completion of 
the Flora Danica of Oeder. Vahl was the author or editor of the 
sixth and seventh volumes of this monumental work, which has 
consumed more than a century in publication. Between 1790 and 
1794 he published in three folio volumes, with many plates, the 
Symbole Botanice, devoted principally to descriptions of plants 
collected by Forsk4l in the Orient ; in 1796 and 1798 were pub- 
lished the two first volumes of his Ecloge Americane, containing 
figures and descriptions of tropical American plants, the third vol- 
ume appearing in 1807. Vahl left unfinished, also, his Enumeratio 
Plantarum, of which the first volume was published in 1804, shortly 
before he died. At his death the King of Denmark purchased 
his herbarium, manuscripts, and botanical library, which is said to 
have contained three thousand volumes. Vahlia, a genus of south 
African herbs of the Saxifrage family, was dedicated to him by 
Thunberg. 
