But, greatly as you tempt me, and much as I should like to see you early, we cannot reach Switzerland this autumn....
I should hope we might see you in early summer. So, pray, keep yourself well and strong till then.
About the “Phytographie:” I shall have much to write, when I read the book, which as yet I have only glanced at. About dextrorsum and sinistrorsum: I think it is not quite true that the innovators have not given any account of the grounds on which they rest. Mine are expressed, I believe, in two or three notes in “American Journal of Science,” and are summed up in my “Botanical Text-Book,” last edition, p. 516, referred to in the glossary and index. I think that the analogy of the right-handed screw indicates how the world in general regard it, ab extra. There is a sensible note on the question in the late Clerk-Maxwell’s “Treatise on Electricity,” vol. 1,—the reference is not at hand at this moment. It takes, essentially, our (my) view as it seems to me; but it refers to a similar confusion between the mathematicians and the physicists.
I wish you had gone on to illustrate more of the words which have been changed or confused in meaning; for example, “pistillum,” “cyme,” etc.
It is a pity that the terms of nomenclature had not been rearranged by Roeper[113] so as to conflict less with those of Linnæus and the general botanical use.
We have had our centennial of the American Academy; a pleasant reunion....
Mr. Winthrop gave a good public address.
I get only slowly on with the Compositæ; my interruptions and distractions are many and great. Fortunately I am in perfect health; am outliving my chronic catarrh. I hope you may do so also!
June 28, 1880.
Yours of the 15th is duly received, with your pleasant remarks on my lectures.[114] Professor Bourier is very welcome, and will please me by using any part of them he chooses. I should like to see how they would read in French.