December ii, 1889.] 



Garden and Forest. 



599 



specimens. It bears well, and the nuts are regularly expected 

 as one of the spontaneous products of the place. On the same 

 ground were several smaller trees (by comparison), though 

 considered in tliemselves they were large. These all came 

 from the seed of the older tree. The soil is a rich sandy loam. 



Ulinits alata is very common at the water's edge near Lower 

 Brandon. So far as my observations there convinced me of 

 anything concerning the corky wings on the branches of the 

 tree, I thought that these excrescences were much more com- 

 mon on the specimens whose growth had in some way been 

 interfered with. I sought in vain for them on the branches of 

 two vigorous individuals which grew on good soil and in 

 abimdant simlight ; but, on the otiier hand, in the trees which 

 grew in the tiiicket, or in places where they had been exposed 

 to mutilation, corky wings were quite conspicuous. 



Finns Tceda, of course, grew commonly enough in suitable 

 places. What most struclc me was its vigorous growth and 

 the size it attained so far north. Judging from the plant life, I 

 should say tiiat the valley of the James was disproportionately 

 warm as compared witli Philadelphia. Harvest is over there, 

 and the grain under shelter, or in the bags, before we on the 

 hill-sides of southern Pennsylvania have commenced to cut it. 

 I am convinced this somewhat abruptchange to a more south- 

 ern appearance of the trees is testimony in the same direction. 



University ol Pennsylvania, Philadelpbin. J. T. Rothrock. 



Melothria pendvila. 



To the Editor of Garden and Forest : 



Sir : — The article on Melothria punctata in GARDEN AND For- 

 est of November 20th reminds me that it may be interesting 

 to some northern readers to learn that our native Wild Gher- 

 kin (J/, penduld) is a very handsome climber bearing yellow 

 flowers of small size, followed by a profusion of black fruits 

 resembling tiny cucumbers. This plant is common in clear- 

 ings, more especially in rich soil, where, in some cases, it en- 

 tirely covers the ground with a dense mat, producing quanti- 

 ties of fruits, which are made into most delicate pickles. 

 Although usually running on the ground, this plant will climb 

 a trelHs, or any object placed for its use. In rough land the 

 vine covers small objects, hiding their unsightliness. The 

 leaves are " cordate, with from three to five angular-toothed 

 lobes," being as handsome as those of M. punctata, and, as 

 seed is freely produced, they can be had in any desired quan- 

 tity. The plant is an annual, and lasts throughout the summer. 



Manatee, Fla. E. N. Reas07ier. 



Recent Publications. 



Scientific Papers of Asa Gray, selected by Charles Sprague 

 Sargent. Vol. I., Reviews of works on Botany and related sub- 

 jects, i8j4-iS8j. Vol. II., Essays : Biographical Sketches, 

 1841-1886. Two volumes octavo. Vol. I., pp. viii, 397. Vol. 

 II, pp. iv, 303. Boston and New York: Houghton, IVIifflin & 

 Company, 1889. 



The writings of Dr. Gray may be roughly divided into three 

 classes, viz. : Contributions to systematic botany, instruction 

 books for students, and miscellaneous papers. By the first 

 class of writings, principally, he won his place among the 

 princes of that branch of learning which its votaries affection- 

 ately call " nostra scientia amaljilis ; " by the second he has 

 educated a generation of botanists in a wider field than his 

 own native land, and by the third he achieved high rank and 

 wide reputation among literary people outside of the realm of 

 natural history. The present volumes contain a large and 

 judicious selection of these miscellaneous papers, beginning 

 at a time when the Natural System, as illustrated by Lindley, 

 was beginning to displace the purely arbitrary and artificial 

 system of Linnaeus, and continued down to the day when the 

 victory had been so long won that the strife was forgotten, 

 and men were now seeking to know what system and struc- 

 ture may teach of vital truth, rather than to pit one system 

 against another. For as the chemistry, the geology and the 

 electrical science of half a century ago are remembered to-day 

 only as leading up to what men now know and do, so the 

 botany of that time is replaced by broader and more intensely 

 interesting principles, facts, theories and researches. 



This progressive change in the scope and aims of botanical 

 science becomes very evident to any one who will read these 

 volumes with even only careless haste, while the niore careful 

 reader will find more than enough to interest and instruct him 

 in die arguments and facts- presented, and will, moreover, be 

 charmed with the clear and simple style of a master of 

 English prose. Dr. Gray's " Reviews" were seldom confined 

 to an account of the book under consideration ; but he usually 

 took up the subject presented, brought out new or forgotten 



facts to illustrate or to confute the theories of the writer, and 

 rarely failed to say a good deal which the author reviewed 

 could read with profit. This is especially true of his reviews 

 of the successive writings of Mr. Darwin, and of De Can- 

 dolle's works on phytography and on the origin of cultivated 

 plants. 



The second volinnc of these selected papers contains 

 fourteen " Essays " and thirty-eight biographical sketches. 

 The first of these essays was published in 1841, and is an 

 account of the chief European herbaria as they then existed, 

 when tiie great herbarium at Kew was yet to be founded by 

 the transfer of the collections of Sir William J. Hcjoker, at that 

 time residing in Glasgow. Several of the later essays were 

 addresses delivered on particidar occasions, as that on 

 " Sequoia and its History," which was the address of the retir- 

 ing President of the American Association for the .Advance- 

 ment of Science, and was delivered at Dubuque, Iowa, in 

 1872. Among the subjects of the biographical sketclies are the 

 names of Robert Brown, Alexander Htimboldt, William Jack- 

 son Hooker, Darwin, George Bentham, and our own Torrey, 

 SuUivant, Agassiz, and Dr. Gray's intimate associate and neigh- 

 bor, Jeffries Wyman. 



We found but few typographical errors in reading these 

 handsomely printed volumes and made no note of them at the 

 time. .Still they do exist, and the Riverside proof-readers 

 ought not to have let such slips as Heloragece and Hibridiza- 

 tion escape their attention. 



It is to be hoped that this series of " Selections " will be con- 

 tinued. Some of Dr. Gray's earlier papers descriptive of new 

 plants are not now to be obtained, and to reprint them would 

 be a great favor to working botanists. 



Periodical Literature. 



Mr. Bradford Torrey has never written a more charming 

 essay than " December Out-of-Doors," published in the cur- 

 rent number of the Atlantic Monthly. It begins with a word 

 of praise for November mildness and sunshine, referring, 

 naturally, to the November of 1888, not to the gloomy, pour- 

 ing month of 1889. The December of .1888, which Mr. Torrey 

 then chronicles more at length, was almost as favorable to 

 out-door rambling, for at its end, he says, he found that, "omit- 

 ting five days of greater or less inclemency, I had spent nearly 

 the entire month in the open air. I could hardly have done 

 better had I been in Florida." The greater number of the 

 pages in which the charms and the trouvailles of the month 

 are recorded tell us of birds and tlieir ways. But a few at the 

 end speak of the December flowers on the northern Massa- 

 chusetts coast. We are not surprised to hear that their num- 

 ber was "limited." It is more unexpected to be told that so 

 many as sixteen different sorts of plants were then and there 

 found blooming in the open air. The hardiest of all local 

 plants, Mr. Torrey thinks, is the common Chickweed {Stellaria 

 media), and the next a Groundsel {Senecio vulgaris). Another 

 kind of Groundsel {Senecio viscosus, a recent emigrant from 

 Europe, very locally established) was likewise counted in 

 bloom, and the thirteen remaining heroes were Shepherd's. 

 Purse, wild Pepper-grass, Pansy, Mouse-ear Chickweed (Q'rrtj- 

 tiuin viscosuni) ,\\x\'a\vq\, common Mallow, Witch-Hazel, Cinque- 

 foil, Many-tlowered Aster, Cone-Hower, Yarrow, Fall Dande- 

 lion and Jointweed. The Cinquefoil was Potentilla Norvegica, 

 not P. argentea, as Mr. Torrey thinks might more reasonably 

 have been expected. Knawel kept on flowering till the middle 

 of January, and Senecio vidgaris "all through December and 

 January, and I know not how much longer." One-half the 

 sixteen were plants that have been introduced from Europe, 

 and six were members of the Composite family. The author's 

 description of his experience with the Witch-Hazel is too pretty 

 not to be quoted entire : "Such Witch-Hazel blossoms as can 

 be gathered in December are, of course, nothing but belated 

 specimens. I remarked a few on the 2d, and again on the 4th; 

 and on the afternoon of Christmas, happening to look into a 

 Hamamelis-tree, I saw what looked like a flower near the 

 top. The tree was too small for climbing, and almost too 

 large for bending, but I managed to get it down ; and, sure 

 enough, tlie bit of yellow was a perfectly fresh blossom. How 

 did it know I was to pass that way on Christmas afternoon, and 

 by what sort of freemasonry did it attract my attention .' I 

 loved it, and left it on the stalk in the true Emersonian spirit, 

 and here I do my little best to embalm its memory." 



We should be glad if our readers in various parts of the 

 country would follow Mr. Torrey 's example and catalogue such 

 plants as they may find in l)loom in midwinter; and if the coming 

 season should prove more inclement tiian the last, tlieir lists, 

 although shorter, would be even more interesting. 



