clxxvi GENERAL SUMMARY OF SCIENTIFIC AND 



The two most important works on the phanerogams of foreign 

 countries liave been the second vokime of the " Genera Plantarum," 

 by Bentham and Hooker, which contains the genera of Gamo'petalm^ 

 and tlie second volume of the " Flora of British India," by Dr. J. D. 

 Hooker. In French there has been a monograph of the Pomece by 

 Decaisne, and continuations of the Primitim Mmiographim Bosarum 

 by Cr^pin. In addition, there have been numerous less important 

 contributions to our knowledge of different genera and orders which 

 we can not particularize in the present connection. 



The leading works on descriptive cryptogamy have been a third 

 volume of the " Species, Genera, et Ordines Algarum," by Professor 

 J. G. Agardh, of Lund, in which he gives a review of the Floridece, 

 but does not acknowledge the results of recent researches in arrang- 

 ing his classification ; and " Notes Algologiques," by Gustave Thuret, 

 edited by Dr. Edouard Bornet, the first fasciculus of which has ap- 

 peared. The plates of the latter work deserve great commendation. 

 Descriptions of new fungi and lichens are contained in numerous 

 short papers scattered through the different journals. Among the 

 more curious fungi are two genera, Kalclibrennera and MacOwanites, 

 described by Berkeley in the Journal of Botany. 



EXPEDITIONS. 



During the present year a report on the botany of Kerguelen 

 Island was made by Dr. J. E. Kidder in the Bulletin of the United 

 States National Museum. The report showed interesting additions 

 to the flora of that island, including phanerogams as well as ci^pto- 

 gams. The reports of different British botanists, Berkeley, Dickie, 

 Eaton, and others, on the collections made by the British Transit 

 Expedition, have been partially published in English journals, but 

 have not as yet been collected into one volume. 



VEGETABLE HISTOLOGY AND CELL STRUCTURE. 



The structure of the cell has been discussed by Strassburger in 

 "Ueber Zellbildung und Zelltheilung." A reply to Strassburger 

 was made by Professor Auerbach in an article entitled " Zelle und 

 Zellkern," published in Cohn's Beitrdge zur Biologie der PJianzen. 

 Auerbach maintained that the cell nucleus consists of a fluid 

 which in time surrounds itself with a wall, and which later contains 

 a number of nucleoli. Strassburger in his work attacks this view of 

 the nature of the nucleus, and says that " Auerbach has, at any rate, 

 considered the vacuoles which form in the nuclei as the nuclei 

 themselves." Auerbach rather acrimoniously replies to this, and the 

 contest seems to be one relating rather to the use of certain techni- 

 cal terms than to a matter of fact. In Pringsheim's Jahrhucher 

 Tschitstiakoff has published an article on the structure of the cell. 



In the Annales des Sciences have appeared a second memoir by 



