Grant Brown, Hotel Anton, 2350 Broadway, New York. May I 
ask you to let me know what action your Club takes in regard to this 
patriotic service? 
Since so full a report was given by each Club at the Annual Meet- 
ing, it is suggested that the January Bulletin be devoted to a dis- 
cussion of this question. There will be no November Bulletin; 
therefore the January issue will be published late in December. This 
will give time for any feasible and useful suggestions to bear fruit be- 
fore Spring work should begin. 
Will all Clubs before closing their club year, give this question 
careful consideration and have some sort of report ready by December 
1st? An organization of active women should be able to give really 
valuable assistance in this time of national need. It may be that 
individual work will be the best plan, but the question should be 
thoroughly discussed and a number of plans of action should be offered 
before a decision is finally reached. 
We are all busy now, but if this is to be a long war we shall be 
busier before it is over. Shouldn't our interest in gardens fit us to do 
some large work in that connection, and shouldn't an appreciable part 
of our time go to such work? 
The Plane Tree 
The London Plane (Platanus acerifolia), now so extensively planted 
here and in Europe, is thought to be a hybrid of our native Sycamore 
(Button-ball; Button- wood) and the Oriental Plane (Platanus orien- 
talis). It was under the spreading branches of the Oriental species 
that the Persian fire-worshipers camped, when holding their religious 
rites, and the tree was sacred to them, as the oak was to the Druids. 
Only four specimens of our native Sycamore (Platanus occidentalis) 
are now known to be in the western part of Europe. In Worthington, 
Indiana, is one, the trunk of which is 42 feet 3 inches in circumference, 
and 1 50 feet high. As there has been much discussion lately as to the 
genus of trees here and in Europe, I shall consider only the tree 
commonly known as, and called, the Oriental Plane, which is really 
the London Plane. It is of the first magnitude, and has so many 
excellent qualities that it is the tree par excellence of the twentieth 
century, and might even be said to be the fashion. Fashions in trees 
must change to meet new conditions of civilization in cities, where the 
soil is permeated with gaseous vapors, heated by steam; where con- 
crete and asphalt pavements retain all the poisonous gases, and keep 
