divisions, and combines these in such manner as to make them throw most light upon one another. Its adaptability to our conditions, and its acceptability to our best educational opinion, is shown by several facts, by its adoption as the unit by the college entrance examination board which has been holding examinations upon it all over the country for six years past, by its use in innumerable high schools, by the agreement between its plan and that of all of the recent and successful text-books, by the final disappearance of all influential opposition to it, and lastly by the substantial concurrence of the unit now in formulation by the teachers of the middle west. With so firm a foundation in a plan we ought to be able to unite on perfecting details. There is no inconsistency between such standardization as this and the greatest freedom in teaching. The optical power of the microscope has not been injured by the standardization of its form and screwthreads.

(To be continued)

The April Bulletin of the Torrey Botanical Club contains an illustrated paper by Philip Dowell on the violets of Staten Island, with a simple key and named habits of all the island forms. Thirty hybrids are also named or described.

The Russian Agricultural Commission has a representative here studying the hardier American fruits and agricultural methods and machinery, with a view to introducing them into the Russian steppes; two representatives from Denmark-one from an agricultural college and one from an experiment station are investigating our production and pathological treatment of forage crops.

A paper read at the Boston meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science showed the effect of various gases on sweet pea seedlings (inhibition of growth, swelling of the growing region, and horizontal placing of the stem). The authors, Knight, Rose, and Crocker suggest the use of these seedlings in detecting traces of illuminating gas, it being well known that gas leakage (in amounts too small for the usual chemi

cal tests) often causes large losses to florists, especially in producing the "sleep" of carnations.

Science (May 6) in the botanical notes mentions an archaic type of seed from the Palaeozoic rocks which was first discovered in 1875 in England by Professor Williamson. It is 5-6 millimeters long and ribbed; the ten ribs forming so many separate arms which project beyond the nucellus for a considerable distance. The plants which bore these seeds have not been found; but Professor F. W. Oliver who described them (Annals of Botany, Jan., 1909) thinks the plants belong to the Cycadofilices, and that the seed is the most primitive seed that has yet come to light."

Under the caption "Children of the Land" the Outlook (April 23) recently described the great school garden movement in Canada. It is really much more than that, for through the munificence of Sir William MacDonald under the management of Dr. Robertson (formerly of MacDonald College) a systematized attempt is being made not only to "adjust the schools and train. the children that the children will be attracted to rural occupations and will be qualified to remain in them," but to give "practical illustrations of how the occupation in each locality may be made more attractive, profitable, and satisfying to those engaged in farming."

Professor Ira D. Cardiff, at the winter meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science described some aberrant walnut fruits from two trees, one in Indiana and one in Tennessee. The fruits (see also the Plant World for April) have a walnut-like basal part, while the opposite part is smooth and fourfurrowed, suggesting the hickory. In all the endocarp is walnutlike; the trees in general aspect, bark (except for some hickory characters in the Tennessee tree), and leaves are walnuts. Crosspollination is not believed by Professor Cardiff to account for the conditions; in each case the nearest hickories are (now) 30 meters from the trees under discussion, and the hybrid (?) character of the fruit is found in "that portion of the nut produced by the

parent sporophyte." A careful study is planned; it is thought that histological characters of the trees may indicate a cross.

The botanic garden papers read at the Boston meeting (A. A. A. S.) have been reprinted in Science (April 29, May 6,). In all the garden is discussed as a public institution, whether from the viewpoint of administration, rare plants, taxonomic completeness, or landscape effects. Professor Blakeslee's paper on the botanic garden as a field museum includes many suggestions, some of which feature in our better botanic gardens and which might be incorporated into many school gardens-even the small ones. A garden dictionary and that of common things-is advocated rather than a "plant circus" where the curious may enter with the expectation of being surprised at oddities in nature and horticulture. Improvement under cultivation, plant diseases, and illustrations of heredity, variation, and hybrids (including even Mendel's law, failing to come true to seed, etc.) may be shown in odd corners of a school garden and with inexpensive material.

An interesting review of Researches on Fungi, by A. H. Reginald Buller, is given in Science (March 18) by Professor George F. Atkinson. The review includes brief mention of the geotropic curvature of the stem of certain mushrooms (in Coprinus an "overtilting or supracurvature four times before it came to rest in the perpendicular position"); the adjustment of the pileus in a horizontal position by the negatively geotropic stem, and the finer adjustment of the gills by their positive geotropism; the immense numbers of spores produced by single individuals (varying from 2,000,000,000 in Agaricus campestris to 7,000,000,000,000,000 in Lycoperdon giganteum; the enormous spore waste, (in Polyporus squamosus, about one spore in a trillion has a "chance of starting a new successful cycle); the resuming of spore ejaculation by many of the xerophytic fungi which have been preserved dry for months or even years; and autodigestion of regions of the inky caps following spore dissemination, the spores being, it is held, anemophilous, and not mixed with the inky liquid and spread by insects.

NEWS ITEMS

At the University of Nebraska adjunct professors Walker and Pool have been made assistant professors of botany.

Professor William James Beal, having completed forty years of continuous service, will resign his professorship in botany at the Agricultural College of Michigan.

Professor John M. Macfarlane of the University of Pennsylvania is planning to spend the coming year in botanical study in several botanical centers of Europe.

Professor J. C. Arthur, Dr. John Hendley Barnhart, and Professor Alexander W. Evans represented the Torrey Botanical Club at the International Botanical Congress held in Brussels May 1420. Dr. Barnhart also has a commission to purchase books for the library of the New York Botanical Garden.

Mr. W. W. Eggleston, recently of the New York Botanical Garden, has been appointed assistant botanist of the Forest Service, U. S. Dept. of Agriculture. He has been detailed for work in Colorado in investigations of poisonous forage plants in cooperation with the Bureau of Plant Industry. He left New York for his new field on May 28.

The Naples Table Association for Promoting Laboratory Research by Women hereby announces the offer of a fifth prize of one thousand dollars for the best thesis written by a woman, on a scientific subject, embodying new observations and new conclusions based on an independent laboratory research in biological, chemical, or physical science. For further information address the secretary, Mrs. A. D. Mead, 283 Wayland Avenue, Providence, R. I.

Announcements of the following summer schools have been

received:

1. The Biological Laboratory at Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island; June to September; tuition $30; for further information address Dr. Charles B. Davenport, Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island.

2. The Mountain Laboratory for Botany and Zoology at Tolland, Colorado; June and July; tuition $20; information may be obtained from Dr. Francis Ramaley, University of Colorado, Boulder, Colo.

3. The Puget Sound Marine Station at Friday Harbor, Washington; no tuition fee, laboratory fees, $10; for further details write Dr. Trevor Kincaid, University of Washington, Seattle, Wash.

The New York State College of Agriculture announces two new fellowships in the department of plant pathology. One provides for the investigation of the use of dry sulphur as a fungicide (both to plants and in the soil) and is established by the Union Sulphur Company (New York City) with an annual appropriation of $3000 for four years. Mr. C. N. Jensen (University of Califfornia) and Mr. F. M. Blodgett (Cornell University) have been appointed to this joint fellowship. The second fellowship, by the Davey Tree Expert Company, provides $750 a year for investigating the heart rot of trees, and has been awarded Mr. W. H. Rankin (Wabash College).