We Americans are wonderfully peaceful--our only real questions now pending are financial, and those not yet treated as they ought to be, on party lines. We have an awful silver craze; but we hope to arrest it before it comes to the worst, though sense and argument are at present ineffectual. We have a comfortable trust in the principle that “Providence specially protects from harm the drunken, the crazy, and the United States of America.” I see our friend Professor Thayer now and then. He is well and flourishing. Mrs. Gray and I are very well indeed, and we send our most cordial good wishes to you all. Very sincerely yours, ASA GRAY. TO J. D. HOOKER. CAMBRIDGE, March 9, 1886. When I read A. de Candolle’s notice of Boissier, I thought it was “charming.” Anyhow, it brought back to me the charming memory of a very lovable man. I dare say neither De Candolle nor I has done justice to Boissier’s work. I could only touch and go,--make a picture that would just sketch the kind of man he was. ... Yes, I have got on Ranunculaceæ, and have done up to and through Ranunculus, minus the Batrachium set, of which happily we have few in North America, that we know of. But having done some while ago the Gamopetalæ of Pringle’s interesting North Mexican collection, I am now switched off to the same in a hurried collection made by Dr. Palmer, in an unvisited part of Chihuahua, in which very much is new. One after another those Mocino[136] and Sessé plants turn up. Also those of Wislizenus, whom the Mexicans for a time interned on the flanks of the Sierra Madre. We are bound to know the botany of the parts of Mexico on our frontier, and so must even do the work. Pringle goes back there directly, with increased facilities, and will give special attention to the points of territory which I regard as most hopeful. Trelease,[137] our most hopeful young botanist,--established at St. Louis,--is here for a part of the winter, to edit a collection of the scattered botanical publications of Engelmann which Shaw pays for--or at least pays for to a large extent. He would have the plates and figures, and that will double the cost and the sum Shaw offered to provide. We may have to sell some of the edition in order to recoup the charges.... Yes, you hit a blot. I can see to all my own books, such as the “Synoptical Flora.” But, somehow, I cannot restrain the publishers from altering the date of their title-pages when they print off a new issue from the stereotype plates.... What do I call an alpine plant? Why, one that has its habitat above the limit of trees--mainly--though it may run down lower along streams. But in a dry region, where forest has no fair chance, we might need to mend the definition. Upon your paper, I got a few notes--offhand, by references.