ZOOLOGY AND BOTANY, MICROSCOPY, ETC. 201 



Australian Botany.*— F. Turner gives an account of the Botany 

 of two districts in New South Wales, namely, New England and the 

 Darling river country. Besides a systematic list of the plants (flower- 

 ing plants and ferns), the author gives notes on the climate and soil 

 of the districts, and also a general descriptive account of the vegetation, 

 and a statistical comparison with the flora of New South Wales as a 

 whole. In the New England districts several genera of orchids are 

 well represented (including Dendrobium, Pterostylis and Caladenia) and 

 also the ferns and fern-allies ; while in the Darling river country only 

 one orchid is recorded — an epiphyte, Cymbidiwn canal iculatum, and five 

 Acotyledons, including two species of Azolla and Marsilea Drummondii. 

 Apropos of the orchid, the author remarks that " it was of some slight 

 food value to the aborigines, who used to eat its pseudo-bulbs, which 

 contain a small amount of starch." 



Arechavaleta, J. — Flora Uruguaya. (Tom. ii.) 



[Contains a synopsis of the series, cohorts and natural orders of polypetalous 

 dicotyledons, according to the arrangement of the Genera Plantarum of 

 Bentham and Hooker, an historical introduction, and an elaboration of the 

 orders from Saxifragaceae to Begoniaeeae inclusive.] 



Anal. Mus. Nation. Montevideo, v. (1903). 

 Fl. Uruguaya, ii., xlviii. and 160 pp. 

 Oramas, D. P. — Algunosdatos massobre el tancelebre Drago de Orotava. (Some 

 facts about the celebrated Dragon-tree of Orotava.) 



[A few points of historical interest on the growth of this famous tree.] 



Bol. Soc. Esp. Nat. Hid., iii. (1903) pp. 324-6. 



Schappner, J. H. — Poisonous and other injurious plants of Ohio. 



[Contains notes of some interest on the nature of the poison and its effects 

 on man and other animals in a large number of plants found in Ohio, 

 including fungi and seed-plants.] 



Ohio Naturalist, iv. (1904) pp. 16-19, 69-73. 



CRYPTOGAMS. 



Pteridophyta. 



Vascular System of the Rhizome and Leaf-trace of Pteris Aqui- 

 lina and P. incisa.f — A. G. Tansley and R. B. Lulham give a detailed 

 account, illustrated by numerous diagrammatic figures, of the course of 

 the bundles in these two ferns. In Pteris incisa the stele of the inter- 

 node is a solenostele, rather flattened in the horizontal plane, and wavy 

 on the ventral side, from which roots are- given off ; but as the node is 

 approached complications arise, which are explained by comparison with 

 the vascular structure previously described by Gwynne-Vaughan in 

 Hypolepis as referable to a false dichotomy of the stem. The vascular 

 structure of the rhizome of Pteris Aquilina is well known, but the con- 

 nexion of the petiolar strands of the base of the petiole with those of 

 the rhizome, has never been previously accurately described. This is 

 now done in detail, and the authors conclude that the vascular system of 

 this fern is a dorsiventral dictyostele of the Polypodiwn type, with an 

 internal system of accessory strands developed in connexion with lateral 

 elaboration of the leaf -trace. 



* Proc. Linn. Soc. New South Wales, xxviii. (1903) pp. 276-31 1,406-42. 

 t New Phytolog., iii. (1904) pp. 1-17 (59 small figs.). 



April 20th, 1904 p 



