51

OFFICE OF
H. E. KRATZ
Supt. City Schools.

Mitchell, Dakota. Feb 13th 1888
Prof. C. E. Bessey
Lincoln Neb.

My Dear Sir and Friend

I have learned with pleasure of your increasing reputation as a Botanist and believe you deserve even more than you have received.

I am anxious to secure a Botany which will describe our rich flora of Dakota, We use Grays with Coulter's Manual for Rocky Mountains, but find only a few descriptions which will apply to our flowers. We have a very interesting flora and if no one has described it any nearer than Coulter there is a large field for some Botanist like yourself to occupy.

Can you give me any help towards securing what we want? Have you a Botany that covers this locality any better than Gray-Coulter's?
That work is also very expensive. We ought to have a cheaper book.

The old scenes on the farm come back to me as I write, but I can not refer to them now.

Hastily but with kindest regards I am
Yours truly H. E. Kratz