IQ4 THE AMERICAN MIDLAND NATURALIST 



has been successfully unloaded on some innocent victim. Inces- 

 santly on the tramp, it falls usually at last into the hands of some 

 merciful, true philanthropist, who, out of compassion with 

 suffering humanity, cremates it, hoping that from its ashes shall 

 rise some new lovable form of life. 



The mounting. Affix the plant to the herbarium paper by 

 means of narrow strips of surgeon's silk plaster or of Japanese 

 glued paper. To apply glue directly to the plant and make it adhere 

 permanently to its supporting sheet is not commendable. Plants 

 ought to be fastened so that they can be easily removed and their 

 places filled with better specimens whenever such occasions offer 

 themselves. Let it always be your aim with the mounting to cover 

 the entire surface of the sheet, no matter how many individual 

 plants are needed. My specimen of Cerastium nutans contains 

 24 plants, of Centunculus minimus 36. One or two, or even eight 

 or ten plants on a sheet give the impression of loneliness and 

 poverty, when 21 is the right number. Our enemies, the Germans, 

 appreciate filled sheets in their own peculiar expression when they 

 ask for exchange sheets wohl aufgelegt. Empty places, not other- 

 wise fillable, could be occupied advantageously by single flowers, 

 which will often display themselves gorgeously, but this suggestion 

 ought not to be made use of too often, as everything becomes tire- 

 some when overdone. 



A trashy heap of disgusting material can often be made over 

 and remarkably improved by steaming, which enables us to unfold 

 the parts, straighten them out and mount them successfully. 



Whenever feasible, place the thicker parts near the sheet 

 margins with the widest possible variety of locations: one root 

 in the left upper corner, another one an inch or more lower down 

 on the left margin beneath, etc., in order to give to the piled 

 sheets an equal thickness centrally, peripherally and all through. 

 By this method and by avoidance of bulk in all forms within your 

 power, there results a remarkable saving in space. And space is 

 valuable indeed. At least it ought not to be squandered in order 

 to make plant specimens ill-looking. I sent out once an exchange 

 package of 100 specimens having a thickness in all its parts of 

 2 inches. The return package, also of 100 specimens, measured 

 7 inches in the medium line and 2 inches on the margins, and the 

 pile resembled the vault of a gothic d6me. 



An all-important matter is also the symmetrical disposition 



