84 STATE POMOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



selyn Botanical Society of Maine is endeavoring^ to secure. The 

 Portland Natural History Society publishes a list of Maine plants 

 to which additions are constantly being made. Among those 

 specially active in this work may be mentioned Merritt L. Ker- 

 nald of Harvard University and Edward B. Chamberlain of 

 Brown University; but the name which should be mentioned 

 with greatest honor as of one having done the largest amount 

 of personal exploration is that of Miss Kate Furbish of Bruns- 

 wick. She deserves highest credit for her work as a collector 

 for many years and especially for bringing her trained skill as 

 an artist to the task of reproducing in color the flowers of the 

 State. Any one may aid in this work by exploring his own 

 neighborhood and by putting himself into connection with other 

 botanists in the State. 



The life history of different plants is another extremely inter- 

 esting line of study. To begin with the seed and to trace the 

 growth of the plant through rootlet, first leaves, root, stem, 

 branches, foliage, flowers, fruit, seed again, until the cycle of life 

 is completed ; to compare different plants at all these stages ; to 

 distinguish annuals, biennials, perennials in their habits of 

 growth ; to notice what office in the economy of the plant the part 

 which we take as food or which serves as food for birds and 

 other animals, was designed to fill ; to study special contrivances 

 as for crop-fertilization in the lady's-slipper, barberry, iris, eve- 

 ning primrose, sage and many other flowers ; or for the scattering 

 of seed as in the witch-hazel, pansy, burdock, bur-marigold, 

 agrimony, dandelion, thistle, milkweed, willow, maple, poplar and 

 so on in a list of indefinite length; all these subjects and many 

 worthy of mention with them such as propagation of plants by 

 runners, layers, cuttings, grafting ; whole classes of plants as yet 

 unmentioned, grasses, sedges, ferns, rushes, fungi, mosses, 

 lichens; all these may furnish endless subjects of profitable 

 study. A few plants must be studied to be avoided because they 

 are poisonous. Fortunately only one plant at all common in 

 Maine is poisonous to the touch and that is the well-known three- 

 leaved ivy or mercury so-called. The simple knowledge that the 

 common woodbine with leaves in five leaflets may be safely 

 handled, and that you must keep your five fingers off of the some- 

 what similar plant with three leaflets, would prevent many cases 

 of severe poisoning. There are certain common roots which are 



