BRAINERD, EZRA (1844-1924), American botanist and educator, was born at St. Albans, Vt., Dec. 17, 1844. He gradu ated at Middlebury college in 1864 and at Andover theological seminary in 1867. Entering the faculty of Middlebury college, he was professor of rhetoric and English literature from 1868 to 1880 and professor of applied mathematics and physics from 1880 to 1886. From 1885 to 1908 he was president of the college. He made important contributions to the geology and botany of Ver mont, and through extensive researches on the native species and their hybrids became the foremost botanical authority on North American violets. His experimental study of hybridity as ex hibited in violets is one of the most valuable as yet made for any group of North American plants. Besides a large number of scientific papers, chiefly botanical, he published The Violets of North America (1921) and Some Natural Violet Hybrids of North America (1924). He also contributed sections on violets to standard North American floras. He died at Middlebury, Vt., on Dec. 8, 1924.