NOTICES OF BOOKS. 351 



NOTICES OF BOOKS 



Jaubert ET Spach : Illustkationes Plantaeum Orientalium; 



0?/, CJioix de Planter Nouvelles ou pen connues de VAde Occidentale, 

 Imp. 4to. Paris. 



The plants of Western Asia ought to have nnore than usual interest 

 to us, now that our armies and so many other British subjects are con- 

 gregating in the Crimea, and that we have so much intercourse with 

 the Turkish Empire. It were devoutly to be wished, that, as Buona^ 

 parte did in Egypt, we should have men of science attached to our 

 annies in countries whose productions are little known to us ; and thus 

 we should be sure to have some favourable results. The present work 

 is eminently rich in the rare and novel plants of these Oriental regions, 

 and most beautifully and carefully are they represented in it. Four 

 volumes complete, and three fasciculi of the fifth volume, are now before 

 us, and well does the work maintain its character. We noticed, in our 

 Journal for 1853, as far as the third number of the fourth volume. 

 The following is devoted entirely to Grasses ; the fifth, or thirty-fifth of 

 the whole work, takes up Compodtm (chiefly occupied by new species of 

 Tulicaria)^ as in the thirty-sixth; while the thirty-seventh, to the con- 

 clusion of the (fourth) volume, contain a fine set of various families of 

 Corollifloree^ and mostly new species. In the thirty-ninth fasciculus, 

 and in all the following, as far as Tab. 429, we find all the figures taken 

 from the celebrated collection of " Vellums (Velins) of the Museum " of 

 the Jardiu des Plantes at Paris, which, as is well known, were commenced 

 under the auspices and direction of Gaston d'Orlcans, brother of Louis 

 XIII., and, is continued, we believe, to the present day, at the expense of 

 the French Government. The finest portion of these were executed by 

 a distinguished artist, who accompanied Toumefort in his voyage to the 

 Levant; and, as the finest collection of drawings of Oriental plants in 

 England are from the pencil of Ferdinand Bauer, so are those in France 

 executed by M. Aubriet. A portion of them have been published by Pro- 

 fessor Desfontaines in the ' Annales du Museum d'Histoire Naturelle/ 



about sixty, we believe. These original drawings, beautifully co- 

 loured from nature, are confined to the * Corollarium Institutionum Eei 



