184 



value. As with most species of Eucalyptus the blue gum has two types of 

 leaves, opposite, broad, bluish juvenile ones and alternate, narrow, yellowish- 

 green ones on older trees. All of the eucah'pts have flowers in which the 

 sepals and petals are fused into a cap that covers the bud, falling as the 

 flower opens. Stamens are usually numerous, over 1,100 in the blue gum and 

 more numerous in some other species, but in a few kinds not over 20. The 

 scarlet-flowered gum, Eucalyptus ficifolia is commonly planted as an orna- 

 mental shade tree — it is a small tree, the large panicles of brilliant flowers 

 make it ver}- beautiful. The manna gum. Eucalyptus, viminalis is one of 

 the large species, specimens over three hundred feet high have been re- 

 ported from Australia (claims of trees 400 or more feet high have all been 

 disproved) making it a rival of the Coast Redwoods as the tallest tree of 

 the world. Of the over five hundred species of Eucalyptus growing in 

 Australia, Tasmania and a few neighboring islands some are tall trees, 

 others are little more than shrubs. One, the coral gum. Eucalyptus tor- 

 quata, is said to flower when only a foot or two tall when grown in 

 pots. A score of species are commonly grow^n in California, others are 

 to be found as specimen trees on estates, or in large collections of the trees 

 such as that at the Huntington Gardens in Pasadena. Possibly the most 

 curious of them all is the bushy j-ate, Eucalyptus Lehmanni, in which the 

 flowers are in compact clusters, the ovaries fused together and the caps 

 making slender horns up to two inches long. In this species pollination often 

 occurs before the caps fall, the latter being pushed off as the fruit begins 

 to develop. One of the most beautiful species is a low form from Western 

 Australia, Eucalyptus erythrocorys, in which the caps are brilliant scarlet 

 above the green ovaries, the stamens are grouped in four clusters and are 

 bright yellow. A few forms, such as Eucalyptus piilverulenta, have the adult 

 leaves round and opposite. E. pulverulenta is a small tree, grown chiefly to 

 furnish cut branches to use for decoration alone or with large masses of 



flowers." 



Cl\t)E Chandler 



Recording Secretary 



AIeetixg of April 21, 1939, at Columbia Uxiversity 



The President, Arthur H. Graves, presided. There were seventy- 

 four persons present. The scientific program consisted of a lecture 

 on "Tissue Culture in Plants" by Dr. Philip R. White of the 

 Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research at Princeton, X. J. 

 The author's abstract follows : 



"The idea of cultivating isolated tissues and cells, as a means of study- 

 ing the supposed 'totipotency' of the cell as an 'elementary organism,' first 

 clearly formulated by Gottlieb Haberlandt in 1902, first successfully carried 

 out with nerve cells by Ross Harrison in 1906, oflfered a potential means of 

 answering many questions in plant and animal physiology. Irwin Smith, 

 seeking to use such a method in studying crown gall tumors of plants was 



