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ARNOLD ARBORETUM,HARVARD UNIVERSITY, Jamaica Plain,Mass,January 24 illegible My dear Muir: Thanks for your note of January
10th with your cool proposition that I should tell you what to say about my book.It was a bad enough job writing it,you may
be sure,without having the duty of reviewing it thrust on me also.You are the fellow that can do this job better than any
one else and we expect you to make here the effort of your life. Your specimen of Sequoia came this morning.It seems to me
tnat it admirably confirms Miss Eastwood's theory that the cones require two years to ripen. Certainly on this specimen there
are cones of two different years, the older and larger cones with fully mature seeds, and the smaller cones with immature
seeds to ripen probably sometime next summer. The smaller cones, too, seem to me to have been produced on wood which was a
year younger than that which bore the larger cones. Examine your tree again closely and you will see, I think, the difference
in the degree of development of the two cones. For the last week I have been laid up with another light attack of grippe
which has left me with a rather bad cough and In a generally miserable condition, still it is nothing as compared with what
I had in October.Mrs.Sargent is much better and able to go out for a little while each day, so I hope the family is on the
mend. 02533