1880. | In North America from 1840 to 1858. 35 
most valuable observations. There is a list of trees and shrubs 
with their northern limits, and a table of the distribution of Cari- 
ces, which was prepared by Dr. Francis Boott, one of the best 
authorities and author of the beautiful “ Illustrations of the genus 
Carex,” the 4th part of which was after his death published by J. 
D. Hooker. Boott was born in Boston, 1792, and died in London, 
1863. : 
In the summer of 1848, Prof. Agassiz made a scientific excursion 
to the Lake Superior with a number of students. He published, 
1850, a volume on the physical character, vegetation and animals. 
Two chapters treat of the botany on the shore of Lake Superior 
compared with that of the Jura and the Alps. The accounts of 
such excursions are highly interesting, when related by compe- 
tent botanists, e. g., that published by Prof. Gray in 1841, in, Szi- 
man’s Journal, “ Notes of a Botanical Excursion to the Moun- 
tains of North Carolina.” 
The most prominent American botanists of our times are 
Torrey, Gray and Engelmann. [(Cé+A~.—_— itv 
John Torrey was born in New York, 1798, and died on the 
roth of March, 1873. Author of many botanical writings, he 
published, as early as 1819, a “Catalogue of plants growing 
spontaneously within thirty miles of the city of New York;” in 
1824 a “Flora of the northern and middle sections of U. S.,” of 
which only Vol. 1 was printed, containing Classes 1-x1 of the 
Linnzan system, which was at that time yet in general use; 
. 1826, a “ Compendium of the Flora of the Northern and Middle 
States ;”’ 1836, a “ Monograph of the North American Cyper- 
aceæ ” (in Annals of the Lyceum of New York, Vol. 111); from — 
1838 to 1843, with Asa Gray, the first two volumes of the Flora 
of North America already mentioned. It contains the orders from 
Ranunculaceze to Composit, and was not continued at that time, 
but will be finished now, since the large amount of new material 
brought from the Western explorations is nearly worked up. In 
1843 appeared his “ Flora of the State of New York,” two large 
quarto volumes, with 162 tables, forming the second part of the 
Natural History of New York. In the preface we find a historical 
sketch of the botanists and their work in the State before that 
-~ time. His other writings are already mentioned, 
Asa Gray was born on the 18th of November, 1810, in Paris, 
Oneida county, New York, and is now Professor of Botany of _ 
