71 



All but a few of the rarer or less important species were dis- 

 cussed from the standpoint of geographical distribution and rela- 

 tions to soil, water, climate, fire, etc. Fire as an environmental 

 factor has hitherto received scant attention, partly because it is 

 commonly regarded as a mere accident, and partly because it is 

 not easy to experiment with. But the different species of conifers 

 differ widely in their relations to fire, and it seems that for almost 

 every type of coniferous forest there is a normal or optimum 

 frequency of fire, varying from perhaps once in two or three 

 years to once or twice in a century. The paper was illustrated 

 by 47 lantern slides. 



Meeting adjourned. 



B. O. Dodge, 



Secretary 



NEWS ITEMS 



William Ruggles Gerard died suddenly in New York City, 

 February 26, 1914. He was born in Newburgh, N. Y., March 29, 

 1 841, and in boyhood entered the employ of a druggist in Pough- 

 keepsie ; he remained in the same business until finally he became 

 proprietor of a drug store in that city. He began the study of 

 fungi at a time when few American botanists had devoted at- 

 tention to that group of plants, his first descriptions of new 

 species appearing in the Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club 

 for October, 1873, before the publication of the earliest myco- 

 logical papers of Burrill, Ellis, Farlow, or Morgan. In the 

 following year he was one of the founders of the Poughkeepsie 

 Society of Natural Science, in whose Proceedings a number of his 

 botanical papers were published. In 1877 he removed to New 

 York City, where he was an active member of the Torrey Botan- 

 ical Club for some years. Before the death of William H. Leggett, 

 the founder and editor of the Bulletin, Mr. Gerard was made 

 assistant editor, and he followed him as editor, filling that office 

 from April, 1882, to December, 1885. In later years he was 

 interested in the derivation of plant names, especially those of 



