November 6, 1914] 



SCIENCE 



679 



Shaw was born in England in 1800, and that 

 coming to America he amassed a fortune by 

 middle life, and retired from business, spend- 

 ing the remainder of his life in beautifying 

 his estate in the suburbs of St. Louis. Even- 

 tually this became known as " Shaw's 

 Garden." About 1860 it was opened to the 

 public, and in 1889 was transfen-ed to a board 

 of trustees to administer the estate under the 

 provisions of Mr. Shav/s will, as the Mis- 

 souri Botanical Garden. The garden has thus 

 no legal connection with the city of St. Louis 

 and it even pays taxes on all of its real estate 

 excepting only the land actually occupied by 

 the garden itself. The garden has been for- 

 tunate in its immediate management, which 

 is vested in its director. The first director 

 ■was Professor William Trelease, who filled this 

 position with distinguished honor until his 

 resignation in 1912, and he was followed by 

 Doctor George T. Moore, whose two years of 

 service have already proved his fitness. 



The general program as announced in Sci- 

 ence for September 11, 1914, was carried out 

 with some additions and changes due to the 

 disturbances caused by the European war. 

 The mornings were spent in visiting places of 

 interest in the city, and at the garden. The 

 midday lunches afforded excellent opportun- 

 ities for extending personal acquaintances. 

 The program of the first afternoon (October 

 15) included after Director Moore's address 

 of welcome (mainly historical), eight papers, 

 six of which were actually presented, the re- 

 maining two being read by title only. Thus 

 the papers by Director Britton (New York), 

 Professor Wille (Norway), Professor Bessey 

 (Nebraska), Professor Conzatti (Mexico), 

 Professor Coulter (Chicago), and Assistant 

 Director Hill (Kew) were presented in full, 

 while those by Doctor Lipsky (Russia), and 

 Director Briquet (Geneva) were not in hand, 

 and were presented by title only. 



The program of the second afternoon 

 (October 16) included ten papers, of which 

 those by Professor Czapek (Prag), Director 

 MacDougal (Desert Laboratory), Doctor Appel 

 (Berlin), Professor Setchell (California), 

 Director Westerdijk (Amsterdam), Professor 



Atkinson (Cornell), and Doctor Smith (Wash- 

 ington) were presented in full, while those by 

 Director Fitting (Bonn), Director Klebs 

 (Heidelberg), and Professor Buller (Mani- 

 toba) were presented by title only. 



The closing banquet was worthy of the occa- 

 sion. Those who have been fortunate enough 

 to be bidden to the " Shaw Banquets " need 

 no description as to what this one was like. 

 It was notable for the profusion of floral 

 decorations, public report asserting that more 

 than six thousand plants were used for this 

 purpose, including about six hundred vari- 

 eties of decorative plants. In a second matter 

 this banquet was notable in that for the first 

 time there were women among the guests, as 

 should be, of course, when we remember the 

 very considerable number of women who are 

 engaged in botanical investigation, and in 

 botanical teaching. 



TEICARPELLARY AND TETRACARPELLART ASH FRUITS 



For several years I have been watching 

 some of the green ash trees (Fraxinus penn- 

 sylvanica) along the streets of Lincoln, having 

 found many years ago that some of them were 

 in the habit of producing triearpellary fruits, 

 in addition to their usual bicarpellary samaras. 

 As a result, several months ago I found one 

 tree that produced these fruits in such num- 

 bers that the case seems to me to be worthy 

 of record. One of my assistants, Mr. F. F. 

 Weinard, collected from this tree 87 clusters 

 of the fruits, and found that the average num- 

 ber of fruits in each cluster was 25, of which 

 on an average ten were triearpellary. In 

 other words of the whole number of samaras 

 examined (2,183) there were 876 that were 

 triearpellary. This means that almost exactly 

 40 per cent, of the whole number of fruits were 

 triearpellary, a proportion that is quite un- 

 looked for. In the same collection there were 

 found four tetracarpellary fruits, that is about 

 one fifth of one per cent. 



Elsewhere in the city other trees were found 

 that produced triearpellary fruits, but it is a 

 well established fact that most green ash 

 trees produce very few, if any, of these ab- 

 normal fruits. 



