GEOGRAPHIC AFFINITIES 
has been a never-ending source of surprises. For twelve years I have 
taken my classes there in October with the hope of showing them 
Scirpus Hallii, isolated by more than 1,000 miles from the nearest 
station in southern Georgia; Echinodorus tenellus, isolated by 260 
miles from the next station to the south, in southern New Jersey; and 
Eleocharis Engelmanni, var. detonsa and Ludvigia polycarpa of prairie- 
sloughs of the Mississippi basin. But for many years, since 1908, 
Winter Pond was low and the shore a sandy beach, with the result 
that these plants have not flourished. In their stead have been found 
such xerophilous species as Aristida gracilis, Crotalaria sagittalis and 
Cassia nictitans. In 1916, however, the summer was extremely rainy 
and when, in October, I took my class to Winter Pond to see the 
Crotalaria and Cassia, we found the shore covered with wet peat, with 
a dense carpet of the long-lost Scirpus Hallii, the Echinodorus, Eleo- 
charis and Ludvigia and practically no Cassia nor Crotalaria to be 
found. Similar experiences were noted on Cape Cod, and as a result 
we now understand that we cannot really know the floras of these 
thousands of pond-shores until they have all been intensively studied in 
both wet and dry years and throughout the season. When, therefore, 
the botanist who still retains a New England conscience is urged to 
"dash off something about the vegetation of New England," he natur- 
ally hesitates to write about what he knows he does not yet understand. 
Throughout this presentation I have used the term phytogeogra- 
phy, not because that term as often used in America signifies an accu- 
rate knowledge of plant-distribution, but because it is a term which 
ought to stand for a scholarly and precise branch of our science. 
Unfortunately, many Americans who have styled themselves phyto- 
geographers have not hesitated to stultify the subject by the publica- 
tion of the point of view that, from the phytogeographer's standpoint, 
the exact identity of the plants is of little consequence. So long as any 
" phy togeographers " hold such views they must not expect to win 
the commendation of those who are striving for final truth. Imagine 
such sentiments expressed by Linnaeus, Wahlenberg, Alphonse de Can- 
dolle, Darwin, Hooker, or Gray! In the American rush to see our- 
selves in print and not to trouble about precision of detail we are too 
apt to forget the wise saying of Dr. Holmes: ''Knowledge and timber 
shouldn't be used till they are seasoned." As I have elsewhere had 
occasion to say, "Much inaccurate and unscholarly publication has 
seriously injured taxonomy; the same tendency intensified has cheap- 
