130 AMERICAN FERN JOURNAL 
time was spent in the pursuit of natural history, in several 
branches of which he was keenly interested—an interest 
which his wife shared with him. He had gathered a 
collection of insects and a large and fine one of ferns and 
flowering plants. Not long ago he gave 1500 mounted 
sheets of the latter to Rochester University. He was a 
member of several natural history societies. 
Mr. Bigelow’s sets of species and hybrids of Dryopteris 
are nearly ready—in fact, may have been sent out by 
the time this reaches our readers. It has been found 
impossible, in one collecting season, to get enough mater- 
ial of some of the rarer hybrids for all of the more than 
thirty sets ordered; these hybrids will therefore be dis- 
tributed, as evenly as possible, among the different sets, 
some in one, some in another. A word as to the system 
of numbering used may not be out of place. All speci- 
mens of the same species or hybrid bear the same arabic 
number. When, as in most cases, the specimens have 
been collected by different persons, at different times 
and places, the separate collections are indicated by 
lower case letters following the number. Thus, ail 
specimens of D. Clintoniana x intermedia are given the 
number 3, the different collections included being desig- 
nated as 3a, 3b, ete. 
Our honorary member, Mr. Carl Christensen, has 
very generously given to the Society a set of all his 
writings of which reprints were available. This is in- 
deed a valuable gift and one for which the Society owes 
Mr. Christensen a large debt of hates 
Mr, C. A. Wentharhs 1062 Main Street, East Hart- 
ford, Conn., offers specimens of Lygodium palmatum to 
members lox postage 
