356 Bibliographical Notices. 



bourhood. The botanical part is the most complete, and may in- 

 deed be considered as a pretty perfect flora of the district. The 

 author has adopted a judicious plan for communicating the greatest 

 amount of information in the least possible space, by not giving lists 

 of the plants, but arranging his matter under the following heads : — 

 1 . A numerical statement of the genera and species of each natural 

 order. 2. A list of the less common plants, taking Watson's ' New 

 Botanists' Guide' as the rule for judging of their rarity. 3. A list 

 of the plants common to the twelve counties referred to by Watson, 

 which he has not found near Askern. 4. The names of a few plants 

 which are but rarely seen there, but which are considered of general 

 distribution by Watson. In the zoological department the more 

 interesting species are noticed, and a complete list of the birds that 

 have been found near Askern is given. The chemical and medical 

 portion of the work appears to be well executed, but that does not 

 come within the objects of our journal. 



Extracts from 'Excursions in and about Newfoundland during the 

 years 1839 and 1840.' By J. B. Jukes, M.A., F.G.S. 



Change of timber in a forest after a fire. — Much of this flat land 

 [in a valley called Southern Gut, Conception Bay,] was covered with 

 raspberry bushes ; and Mr. Cousins informed me, that after a fire in 

 the woods the first thing that covers the ground is a luxuriant 

 growth of raspberry bushes, which are gradually succeeded by a 

 thick wood of birch, although previous to the fire nothing but fir 

 and spruce may have been seen for miles. — Vol. i. p. 45. 



Newfoundland Dogs. — A thin short-haired dog came off to us 

 today. The animal was of a breed very different from what we un- 

 derstand by the term Newfoundland dog in England. He has a thin 

 tapering snout, a long thin tail, and rather thin but powerful legs, 

 with a lank body, the hair short and smooth. These are the most 

 abundant dogs of the country, the long-haired curly dogs being com- 

 paratively rare. They are by no means handsome, but generally 

 more intelligent and useful than the others. This one caught his 

 own fish. He ate on a projecting rock beneath a fish-flake or 

 stage where the fish are laid to dry, watching the water, which had 

 a depth of six or eight feet, and the bottom of which was white with 

 fish-bones. On throwing a piece of cod-fish into the water, three 

 or four heavy clumsy-looking fish, called in Newfoundland " scul- 

 pins," with great heads and mouths, and many spines about them, 

 and generally about a foot long, would swim in to catch it. Then 

 he would " set" attentively, and the moment one turned his broad- 

 side to him, he darted down like a fish-hawk, and seldom came up 

 without the fish in his mouth. As he caught them he carried them 

 regularly to a place a few yards off, where he laid them down; and 

 they told us that in the summer he would sometimes make a pile of 

 fifty or sixty a day just at that place. He never attempted to eat 

 them, but seemed to be fishing purely for his own amusement. I 

 watched him for about two hours, and then the fish did not come ; 

 I observed he once or twice put his right foot into the water and 



