6 
I wish you had wriv&eu 'io aav t — £&»&&i<kxug 
discourteous treatment so that I could have picked out myself if I have 
been an offender. And I wish I knew if it was the Harvard Botanic Garden that 
deserved criticism, and thrust aside so lightly your desire for scientific 
ties in the United States. In my letter written last night I attempted in 
a side-note to explain how a message might have failed to reachme if de¬ 
livered in Cambridge. Perhaps a more detailed explanation may be worth 
while if you are interested. My herbarium, until last winter, v,as situated 
twenty-seven miles from Boston. Communications addressed to me there usually 
received prompt and sympathetic treatment. My laboratory in the University 
is at Forest Hills in the Bussey Institution. Although I am Director of 
the Botanic Garden of Harvard University I depend on a Head Gardener to 
keep the classes supplied with materials and as the Garden is simply for 
the propagation of specimens for the laboratories I spend very little time 
there. A Head Gardener is not always as efficient in attending to details 
of correspondence and executive work as one might suppose and his mind is 
is usually so occupied with routine duties that outside relations of the 
Garden do not interest him.Consequently communications connected with dis¬ 
tant projects have very little importa nee and he may make errors in 
judgement as to the necessity for their transmissal and never call them 
to the attention of the Director. So much simply for justification if 
myself if against me you hold any resentment or harbor a hostile thought. 
I shall always regret that an opportunity to put forth in co-operat¬ 
ion with you a volume of Orchidaceae similar to the one on the orchids of 
Mt. Kinabalu, or to the one 01 S the orchids of the Philippines has been 
lost. 
Yours sincerely. 
