egg. German peasants often place eggs 

 and loaves of bread into the fields to se- 

 cure a fruitful harvest and for a similar 

 purpose, Easter eggs are rolled over the 

 fields in certain parts of England. 



The Pongol festival in India, to wel- 

 come the rice crop ; the feast of the Zulus 

 which occurs in December, when a bul- 

 lock is sacrificed and the formal opening 

 of the harvest in certain parts of Eng- 

 land, before the crop is cut, are all sur- 

 vivals of the aboriginal sacrifices to the 

 Great Spirit to secure good harvests 

 and immunity from pestilence. 



The Roman custom of celebrating 

 their festival with flowers and songs, 

 has been maintained by the Catholic 

 Church to the present day. The pro- 

 fusion of garlands of the past have given 

 way to flowers typifying purity, as bet- 

 ter fitting the spirit of the occasion, as 

 it is now observed. Hence it naturally 

 came about that the lily was chosen to 

 symbolize the sacred associations that 

 cluster around the Easter observance. 



In 1875 a beautiful form of the lily 

 family was brought by a woman to Phil- 

 adelphia from Bermuda. This lily (Lili- 

 um longiflorum) at once obtained great 

 popularity by reason of its unusual size, 

 the large number of flowers on each stem 

 and their extraordinary beauty and pur- 

 ity. The imported plants were soon 

 bought by Mr. W. K. Harris, of Phila- 

 delphia, who named it the Liliam har- 

 risii, but at the present time it is known 

 as the Lilium longiflorum variety cxi- 

 mum. 



The great beauty of the flowers, the 

 fact that the plants mature early in the 

 season, and their ability to endure a 

 high temperature, allowing them to be 

 forced to bloom during the winter all 

 combined to make this lily the universal 

 choice for the t}'pical Easter flower, which 

 position it still worthily maintains as 

 though conscious of the deep significance 

 of the festival of which it is the chosen 

 floral emblem. 



Charles S. Raddin. 



A BOTANICAL SCRAPBOOK. 



One of the most valuable of all books, 

 yet one that the poorest may readily pos- 

 sess, is a scrapbook in which the student 

 of any particular subject may preserve 

 all items and fugitive articles of especial 

 interest discovered in the course of his 

 daily reading. 



The botanist, especially, will find a 

 well kept scrapbook of inestimable value, 

 for in it he can place many articles de- 

 scribing new discoveries, or rare species, 

 in the plant world. These often appear 

 in the newspapers and magazines, and 

 otherwise would be lost, or at least occa- 

 sion a prolonged search, if wanted for 

 reference. 



In accounts given by travelers and ex- 

 plorers one can often find descriptions of 

 rare discoveries, with which are furnished 

 illustrations from photographs not other- 

 wise obtainable. One young girl made a 

 practice of looking over the periodicals 

 at the library e^rf^ry week, and when a 



botanical article appeared, she bought 

 that particular number at the news-stand 

 and transferred the article to her scrap- 

 book. In this way she kept posted on 

 all new discoveries and investigations, 

 and gained a great deal of fresh infor- 

 mation, while at the same time a refer- 

 ence library of no mean value was ac- 

 cumulated. 



To obtain the best results, some order 

 must be observed in the disposal of the 

 clippings, Separate portions of the 

 book must be allowed for the various di- 

 visions of the subject; or what it better, 

 have several volumes ; one, say, for trees, 

 one for ferns, another for myths and 

 folklore, etc., or any other divisions suit- 

 ing the fancy of the compiler. 



Reg-ular botanical journals, of course, 

 should not be mutilated, but preserved 

 whole and each volume bound with the 

 index, which is usually given at the end 

 of each year, or volume. 



Elma Iona Locke. 



185 



