Hilgard, Theodore Charles 

 l#f6 t July 30th 

 Belleville, Illinois. 



Dear Doctor, 



TRANSLATION 



I received your letter day before yesterday and shall report immediately 

 about Frasera and oak; I would have done yesterday, but circumst nces prevented 

 me from dojng it.— I have 120 dry root specimens of Frasera, but am going to send 

 them together with the oaks. Furthermore, I was able to obtain *f Frasera plants of 

 which I want to dry larger pieces so that you can esch cut them up later the way you 

 wish.~ IVith regard to the oaks, I found that the trees do not have any acorns which 

 will be ripe this year. I found only one tree which had very many. The tree seems 

 tote sickly since it was in flower last year much later. I tried toset specimens for 

 you, but the leaves were in such state of öecay that of the approximately 50 specimens 

 I took, I could select only 10 in medium shape which might be useable; furthermore, 

 the leaves were unusually small, badly developed, lusterless and füll of little knots f 

 more so than the othere trees. Therefore, it seems to me that I can do nothing but dry 

 good leaves with this year's acorns and to cut off next year 120 small branches with 

 young acorns and to add one to each leaf specimen; Eugen would do this. I should be 

 glad to dry the specimens next year, but believe I shall have left here before the 

 right time. 



My pile of dried plants of which I don't know the names is getter larger and larger. 

 It is already one foot high. There is nothing I can do but to take them to you at 

 the beginning of next winter, i.e. at the end of the flower ing period; also, I 

 believe that you don't have much time during the summer and fall for the determination 

 of plants. By the way, I shall again collect some flower of such plants which are 

 easily recognizable by the *he pale buds. I am sorry that I couldn't do it with the 

 Solidago species since it is hard for me to distinguish them so that I cannot determine 

 them myself. Up to now only species is in flower here, but I am trying already now 

 to determine the srarious species as much as pessible aecording to feteras, leaves and the 

 number of leaves which form a cycle at the stem; however, now the question arises whether 

 the number in some species varies? Solidago canadensis seems to me rather variable with 

 regard to its looks. The plant in my collection which you called S. canad. has 5/13 

 divergence; is this di. usual? Namely, I have found other Solidago plants which, as I 

 can see, are not one bit different from S. canad . except that they have a divergence 

 of 2/5 and the other 3/8. Furthermore, I recently read in Bischoff the following "8 

 such (2-leaved) whorls, forming 16 lines would seem only as an excaption in the Canadian 

 Solidago". Does that mean that the leaves of this plant have aome times whorls, or 



6 7 8 9 10 Missouri 



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