THE AMERICAN BOTANIST. 77 
The V'alue of Botany. — The importance of the study, as a 
means of mental disciphne, aside from teaching the habit of ob- 
servation, chiefly Hes in the value that must be given to evidence. 
Facts, often of the must delicate nature, must be weighed to come 
to a decision. The same process has to be followed, not only by 
the judge and the statesman, but by those in all the walks of life. 
Failing to give the proper value to evidence may result in success 
or disaster, and as far as facts are involved, whatever disciplines 
the mind for this will be of the greatest benefit in imparting men- 
tal habits.— £. /. Hill, in Plant World. 
A Luminous Moss. — Taking my way back toward the brook 
T came to a mass of rocks tilted together in such a way as to form 
something like a cave; looking down this fissure into the semi- 
darkness I saw a circle of light about a foot in diameter. Think- 
ing this might be some decaying matter that gave out phosphores- 
cent light, I examined some of it and fotnid I had a very delicate 
frond-like moss which proved to be Schistostega osmundacea. I 
Best, to whom I sent a specimen, put me right as to its luminous 
appearance, as I had mistaken its light as due to phosphorescence 
instead of its cells being constructed so as to focus the light rays 
and then reflect them. — J. W. Huntington in Bryologist. 
The Germination of Seeds. — Nature has various ways of 
keeping up the numbers of a given species and one of the most in- 
teresting is concerned with the germination of seeds. Some years 
ago it was show^n by careful experiment that the seeds of the home- 
ly clot-bur (Xanthinm) two of which are enclosed in each prickly 
bur,germinateinsuccessiveyears,so that if the plant which appears 
the first year meets with misfortune, there is still a chance for the 
next year. Of single seeds of other species, it would appear that 
not all germinate the first year under the same conditions. Some 
seeds of the partridge pea (Cassia chaniae crista) planted in the 
spring germinated very sparingly, but this year the same bed is 
producing numbers of the plants without seeds being sown and 
without having been re-seeded by last year's plants. This shows, 
apparently, that the partridge peas seeds are in no hurry to grow. 
