admiration of the whole establishment, which was considered one of the sights and glories of the city.

On coming out I was told something that interested me more than the wholesale pork factory had done. A gentleman was standing at the door of an office close by, and in the course of conversation with him, the subject of tornadoes came up, in reference to one that had done some damage there two years before. There was a very large iron oil reservoir a few yards from the office, something like the largest-sized cylindrical steam boilers, supported on a strong wooden framework. The tornado struck this cylinder, lifted it off its support, and threw it down some yards away. Yet our friend's office and other small wooden buildings close by were absolutely untouched by it. This illustrates a peculiar feature of these storms, which, though sometimes sweeping along the surface and destroying everything in their track for miles, at other times seem to pass overhead, descending occasionally to the surface and then rising again, picking up a house or a tree at intervals. The kind of destruction a tornado often produces is well shown in the photograph of the main street of Sauk Rapids, Minnesota, after the tornado of the preceding year (April 14, 1886). This town is about two hundred miles north of Sioux City.

Leaving Sioux City in the afternoon, with several stoppages and changes I reached Kansas City at six next morning. After breakfasting there, I went on to Lawrence through a pretty country in the valley of the Kansas river, the rich alluvial land still partly covered with wood, and apparently unoccupied. Several camps of emigrants (or migrants) with waggons, etc., were passed. On the sides of the railway there were dots, clumps, and even large patches of the beautiful Phlox divaricata, with brilliant bluish-purple flowers. No other flower was seen, but the trees were just coming out into leaf, hardly so forward as with us at the same time of year, though twelve degrees further south.

At Lawrence, a small town of ten thousand inhabitants, is the State University, where I was to lecture on the "Colours of Animals." The buildings are on the top of a hill a little

way out of the town, on a plateau of rock almost like a natural pavement. There are fine views over the plains of Kansas all round, something like the view from Blackdown over the Weald, but less woody and less cultivated. In the museum I saw a good collection of the fossil plants from West Kansas. They are found in a fine-grained iron sandstone, mostly in nodules which split open showing the leaf most beautifully, often with the stalk and articulation perfect and in one case a complete bud in the axil of a leaf. The interesting thing is, that they are mostly Dicotyledons of very peculiar forms, though the rock is of cretaceous age. Icthyosaurus remains are also found, sometimes with portions of the skin and keeled scales.

After my lecture in the evening there was a reception of the professors and their families. I heard much of the coeducation system, and, as usual, all in its favour. A lady is professor of Greek, and at Des Moines a lady is the principal, although there are pupils of both sexes up to eighteen years old. Everywhere the girls hold their own with the boys, and are often superior to them in languages. At the last high school examination here, thirteen girls and eleven boys "graduated."

Next day I went on to Manhattan, where there is a State Agricultural College, at which I was to lecture. During the journey of about one hundred miles, I passed through much rich alluvial land, with rolling prairies in the distance. Sometimes there were bluffs of horizontal strata, with frequent projecting masses of rock, many of which had broken off and lay at the foot of the slope. There were many wooded gullies with the trees nearly in full leaf, but no flowers anywhere. About the farmhouses there were usually a few trees, also some good-looking orchards and a few vineyards.

At Manhattan, which I reached early in the afternoon, it was very hot and very dusty. At five o'clock President Geo. F. F. Fairchild called, and we had some interesting talk about the college. This, too, is open to both sexes, and one-third of the pupils are women. Some come direct from the common and high schools, others are adults. The men learn the theory

and practice of agriculture, agricultural chemistry, English, mechanics, use of tools, etc. The girls and women learn horticulture, cooking, domestic economy, poultry rearing, etc. In the evening I strolled about the town; no liquor-shops, but abundance of "real estate" and loan offices, the former a common mode of gambling in Western America.

Next morning (Sunday) Professor Marlott called with Mr. Hogg, a young Englishman farming here, who had a ranch of a thousand acres twelve miles out. He offered to take me for a drive. We went a few miles round the city, by fine grassy fields on the improved prairie, but saw very few flowers. Mr. Hogg complained of the climate; the long very cold winter, often 20° below zero, Fahr., and the hot dusty summer. There are only a few pleasant months in winter and spring, few nice houses, and no gardens. After dinner I took a walk alone across the river to some woods and alluvial meadows, but all very dusty and no flowers. After tea, Professor E. A. Popenhoe, a botanist, called in his buggy and took me for a drive to the top of a rocky bluff where there were a number of interesting plants, of which a few were in flower, among them Tradescantia virginica, a Sisyrinchium, a yellow Baptisia, etc.

On Monday morning I went to the college to put up my diagrams, and was then, of course, taken over the buildings from top to bottom. Everybody wanted to show me everything in their departments-the clothes the girls made, the nice cupboards they kept the clothes in, the store-rooms for flour, potatoes, sugar, spices, jams, etc., the kitchen and all its arrangements. Then every class-room, and all the classes, and all the teachers. Then out-of-doors to see the sheds and stables, the cattle and the horses, and the machines; how the calves and the cows are fed; to inspect the tool and work-shops, the gardens, the greenhouses, the tree-nursery, etc., which latter interested me most.

I spent the afternoon at the hotel writing letters, and in the evening I went to tea with President Fairchild-a regular country high tea; cold meat, oranges, strawberries, cakes, weak green tea, etc. We talked politics, and especially pro