Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1890-05-23
RARE, CURIOUS PLANTS.
FIFTY THOUSAND SPECIMENS IN A
PHILADELPHIA HERBARIUM.

PHILADELPHIA HERBARIUM.
Flowers, Seeds and Vegetable Curiosities
Secured Through Risk of Life-A Re-
markab1e Collection of Natures Won
ders-Plants from Everywhere.
The biological school of the University of
Pennsylvania can boast of herbarium of
$4,000 botanical specimens. These are large
ly plants gathered in Philadelphia from all
over the world and dried and preserved.
There is included an almost complete col
lection OF North American fauna; another,
nearly as full, of the flowers of the Sand
witch Islands; number of specimens from
Russia, Southern Europe, the Cape of Good
Hope, Australia, the West Indies and the
northern part of South America; an almost
perfect representation of the MOSES of
eastern United States and of the ferns Of
North America, and very good working
exhibit of American lichens Many of the
plants were secured at the risk of life
Some were plucked from dizzy heights by
the adventurous collectors, and others call
to mind interesting facts of another kind.
The group of clematis, Or virgins bower,
is represented by specimens from all over
the west, Florida, Mexico and Australia.
One western variety, with long, fuzzy white
punches of blossom, tradition says, has
been used by Indians to revive their horses
when dropping. The specimens of coptis,
or golden thread, a small and delicate look
ing plant, show that it grows all over the
northern part of this hemisphere, in Penn
sylvania Labrador and Sitka, Alaska. The
native country of the monks hood is
live loI IT, / L, j. IL
long spurred, yellow aquilegia were selling
at fabulous price, owing to their scarcity.
Prior to that time the plant was scarcely
ever seen in larger quantities than punches
foot square. DIR. Rothrock, professor of
botany at the university, went west that
year, and at Willow Spring, Arizona, he
came upon twenty acres of these beautiful
flowers, with spurs four or five inches long.
A specimen of the berberis, or mountain
grape is particularly interesting, because
IN the northern part of the western coun-
try, where doctors are not to be found, it is
used by the natives as drug. 1t has alter
native properties, is an efficient tonic, and
by mixing with sugar and fermenting it's
small blue berry can be made into whole
some wine. There are dried tufts of draba
or whitlow grass from half dozen places
all over the world-Oregon, the Alps, Sibe-
ria, the island of Grand Manan, in the Bay
of Fundy, and British Columbia One be-
longs to a variety which Dr. Rothrock
thinks has but half a dozen representatives
in all the herbaria in the world 1t was
procured by Bischoff, accompanying the
Western Union extension in Sitka, Alaska,
in 1865.
A Colorado plant of the same family was
found on a spot 5000 feet above the sea. 1t
is curious to notice in this variety the draba
Alpha, that, owing to the GOODNESS of it's
native place, the foliage is all dwarfed and
knotted, while the process of producing
flower and fruit is as luxuriant as that of
specimens found in milder climates An
other draba brought from Wyoming by
the northwest Wyoming expedition in 1878
is still more dwarfed. Six specimens of the
cochlearla oblongifolia, or scurvy grass, are
particularly interesting on account of a
story that is told of the plant. 1t is princi-
pally found in the northern regions, quite
betting the vicinity of the north pole, and
appearing as it does very early in the year,
in times gone by it was the saviour of
scores of crews dying from scurvy, being
eaten with perfect impunity The universe
tvs specimens come from Norton sound and
Sitka, Alaska and Plover bay, Eastern ST.
IBERIA. The Claytonia sibirica illustrates
how wonderfully plants adapt themselves
to conditions of climate. One of these in
the herbarium from California has leaves
and stem four times as large as those of
another from Siberia, while the flowers and
fruit Of both are of equal size.
A dried plant named after Gen. Fremont,
brought from California is called the slip
perry elm, though it is not related to the
family of the eastern slippery elm, but is
much more nearly related to the holly
hook. There is no more interesting object
in the collection than twig broken from
a variety of the canotia, which was found
in the ella valley Of Arizona. This is
leafless tree, which winter and summer
alike stands extending into the air long,
bare, skeleton like branches The flowers
grow out directly from the wood. Previ-
GUS to 1874 there had been only rumor of
the existence of this tree. During that
year DR.. Rothrock, while in Arizona, saw
several of them, but simply thought them
dead until chance led him to approach one
and he secured specimen, which is almost
priceless in value to him.
A number of dried dahlias, some of them
also from the ella river illustrate, too, the
tendency of plants under certain circum-
stances to lose all large leaves and also to
acquire numerous oil glands along the
stems, which appear under the microscope
like knots of red and yellow gum. The
varieties of sumach represented in the
herbarium number among them one from
Center county, Pa, which is SO poisonous
that susceptible people dare not approach
within thirty feet of it, and another quite
common in this neighborhood, with berries
covered by scarlet hairs, which is not dan
gerous.
A dried tuft of chamaebalia from Cali
fornia, although it has been preserved for
fifteen years, after having been soaked in
alcohol and corrosive sublimate still re-
tains something of the strong resinous odor
for which it is famous. A specimen of ivesia
Gordoni, nearly allied to the common five
finger, was secured in Colorado at an ele-
walton of 1900 feet after a hard days
climb, DIR. Rothrock, the collector, being
laden with a cistern thermometer, rife and
tin botanical box. There are also speci-
mems of the horkelia, potentilla and third
plant, which were not known until DR..
Rothrock came upon them, all within
space of thirty square feet, in the noun
tains of California The presence of num-
Der of plants of the sedum rhodiola or
house leek variety points reminiscence of
the ice period in North America
These specimens in the herbarium come
from the high mountains of
Germany, Labrador the island of Grand
in the Bay of Fundy; Colorado,
Eastern Siberia and the Roam mountains
of South Carolina. The plant only grows
in very cold attitudes. The theory is that
long ago the ice, moving southwark along
this continent from the neighhorhood Of
the North Pole, by cooling the surface of
the ground in British America and in the
northern part of what is now the United
States, made a path for this Arctic plant to
migrate southwark. The ice melted and
the surface of the earth grew warm again.
The plant had already reached the noun
tains of South Carolina, and on the coolest
peaks Of these it still survives 1t has al
most entirely disappeared, however, from
the line of southern advance.-Philadel-
phia Times.
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