290 RETIREMENT, TO 1897 : BOTANICAL WORK 



But when, granting that the suggestion lamed the sentence, 

 he suggested that it be rewritten, so as to draw the currently 

 accepted distinction between these, the next letter revealed 

 that his friend had made entirely new observations on the 

 persistence of portions of the sheath (known as ' pseudophyll ' 

 and ' limb ' respectively) in the branch as well as in the culm 

 of the Bamboo, and Hooker responds (August 26) : 



There you ' 'ave me on the 'ip,' as a Cockney friend once 

 addressed me in a friendly dispute. I took it for granted, 

 in my ignorance, that pseudophylls were restricted to culm 

 sheaths. That they are not suggests a close examination 

 with the view of ascertaining whether or no a transition may 

 be found from the pseudophyll to the true leaf-blade. It 

 would be satisfactory in either case to correlate them with 

 some functional or morphological character of the plant. . . . 



The matter of the pseudophyll is of great moment to 

 me. I cannot find its special attributes described, or even 

 alluded to in any other accounts of Bambuseae that I have 

 as yet consulted than yours, and I must bring it in in a note 

 prefatory to the account of the tribe in the ' Fl. Brit. Ind.' 

 (by Gamble 1 ), over which note I shall ask you kindly to 

 cast your eye when I get to Bambuseae. Also I expect I 

 shall have to introduce observations from the ' Bamboo 

 Garden ' under the Indian species, as to which I must have 

 your good offices. . . . 



I have asked Stapf to look out for any other grasses with 

 all the sheaths normally deciduous from the node by a clean, 

 clear-cut line, as in Bambuseae. I think I can name cases 

 where the true blade when sessile on the sheath disarticu- 

 lates, but none where the true blade is petiolulate. All such 

 reminiscences are, however, very untrustworthy. I only 

 wish I had had the point in my mind when working up 

 the Indian grasses. It is most interesting to find a field of 

 research opened up by a study of the last tribe of the Order ! 



The Camp, Sunningdale: September 1, 1896. 



DEAR MITFOBD, Since I wrote yesterday I have tackled ' 

 a proof sheet in which Bambusa sees the light ; so I thought 



1 James Sykes Gamble, C.I.E., M.A. (Oxon.), F.R.S., F.L.S., late Conserva- 

 tor of Forests in India, and Director of the Imperial Forest School, Dehra Dun. 



