62 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLIV. No. 1124 



largely original and advisedly subordinated to 

 the text. The Rural Science Series contains 

 many valuable treatises, and although com- 

 parisons are invidious, none shows greater evi- 

 dence of most careful writing in the face of 

 an obvious necessity for compression. Bee- 

 keepers, both amateur and commercial, and 

 teachers in agricultural colleges, are under a 

 debt of gratitude to the author of this book; 

 if it does not come to be regarded as the 

 standard handbook on the subject on this con- 

 tinent we shall be greatly surprised. 



0. Gordon Hewitt 



A VALUABLE UNPUBLISHED WORK ON 

 POMOLOGY 



Most horticulturists are doubtless familiar 

 with "A View of the Cultivation of Fruit 

 Trees of America," published in 1817 by 

 "William Coxe, of Burlington, N. J., who has 

 been called " The Father of American Pomol- 

 ogy," but probably few are aware of the exist- 

 ence of an unpublished book of colored draw- 

 ings of the fruits that were illustrated in this 

 work by wood cuts. On pages 225-226 of the 

 Country Gentleman, of Albany, ~N. Y., for 

 April 2, 1857, there was published by 

 E[dmund] L[aw] R[ogers], Baltimore, Md., 

 an account of the activities of Mr. Coxe, in 

 which it is stated that he had intended pub- 

 lishing a second edition of the work, accom- 

 panied by colored engravings for which nat- 

 ural-size water-color drawings had been pre- 

 pared by his daughters. The publication of 

 this second edition was prevented by Mr. 

 Coxe's death in 1831. About twenty years ago 

 this article came to the attention of Mr. 

 William A. Taylor, then assistant pomologist 

 of the TJ. S. Department of Agriculture, and 

 a number of letters were written in an effort 

 to locate the colored drawings, but without 

 success. The matter was then dropped until 

 the spring of 1915 when, in a conversation re- 

 garding some old horticultural catalogs, Mr. 

 Taylor related these facts to the writer who 

 suggested that it might still be possible to 

 locate the unpublished colored plates through 

 methods used by genealogical research workers. 



The search was begun by looking up at the 

 Library of Congress historical and genealog- 

 ical works which might give information re- 

 garding the descendants of William Coxe, 

 with the result that a list of his children was 

 obtained, with some of their marriages. From 

 this it was learned that Philadelphia and 

 vicinity was at present the most likely local- 

 ity to search for his descendants. Addresses 

 were obtained of several of the Coxe family in 

 that vicinity and a form letter sent to all of 

 them giving the object of the inquiry, with 

 the result that a chart of this branch of the 

 family, only recently published, was secured 

 by the writer. This gave the names of all 

 descendants to date, but without addresses, 

 although the places of births were usually 

 given. With this clue several city and tele- 

 phone directories were consulted and addresses 

 of most of the descendants obtained. About 

 twenty-five copies of the form letter were then 

 sent to these addresses with the almost imme- 

 diate result of six replies giving the address 

 of the probable possessor of the work, followed 

 the next day by a letter from one of the twenty- 

 five addressed acknowledging the possession 

 of the work. 



It is with great pleasure that announcement 

 is made of the donation of the unpublished 

 colored drawings of fruits to the Library of 

 the U. S. Department of Agriculture by the 

 grandchildren of Mrs. Elizabeth (Coxe) Mc- 

 Murtrie, a daughter of William Coxe, by 

 whom most of the paintings were made. The 

 drawings are bound and in an excellent state 

 of preservation. The character of the work 

 shows a high degree of skill on the part of the 

 artist in depicting fruits; and the positive 

 identification of all the earlier descriptions 

 and illustrations, some of which have long 

 been in doubt, will now be possible. The work 

 has been placed in a fireproof building and it 

 is expected that the additional safeguard of a 

 fireproof safe for this and similar books will be 

 provided at an early date. 



The drawings are accompanied by the bound 

 manuscript upon which the published work 

 was based, to which have been added numerous 

 notes intended for a second edition. Many of 



