56 
THE AMERICAN BOTANIST 
the rose geraniums, the nasturtiums, the oxaHs, each of these 
species in several varieties. I do not know that I ever did 
examine them all, all through, before ; if I have, I overlooked 
one curious thing. The nasturtium has a spur and it always 
seemed a very distant relative, since it had to be considered 
one of the family ; but I found a connecting link that made it 
as near as second cousin to the zonale geraniums. The pelar- 
gonium comes between the two, its general effect being most 
like the geranium, but in detail there are the two upper petals 
larger and v/ith lines of dark color in the throat like the nas- 
turtiums, and it has the spur. I never saw that before, but 
the key in Gray said it was there, so I looked for it. One 
sepal is larger than the others and it is prolonged into a spur 
which is adherent to the pedicel. This was not hard to find 
when one knew it was there, but surely the other geraniums 
have no such appendage ! Look closely at the slender pedicels ; 
there is a hollow side — a spur really — running clown one side 
nearly to the end. It is in them all, hard to find, almost 
absorbed, but it is there. Now think of that for a botanist 
to have missed ! Or do I assume too much when I call my- 
self by that honorable name? 
How many of us have a picture in our minds of the 
arrangement of the stamens in the Bignonia family? I have 
on a pergola Tecoma jasminoides and on an arbor Bignonia 
veniista, both perfectly grand, each one willing to take the place 
and doing its very best for it, and actually would smother the 
house and us if not kept within their own territory by constant 
pruning. They are supposed to take turns, the Bignonia 
blooming through the w^inter months, the Tecoma in the sum- 
mer, though both are in bloom much of the time and there 
are always some flowers on them both. So I have admired, I 
have praised, I have loved them ; I have given away the flow- 
ers and the roots to all who would take. I thought I had 
fully sounded their depths and that the bignonias were such 
