178 Scientific Reviews. 



and instructs at every step. Many objections have been urged to 

 the natural system, such as that it requires a previous knowledge 

 of the names of plants, and that it is therefore totally unfit for a 

 student who has no assistance ; and we do allow that the Linnaean 

 mode is that by which one may more easily make out the name of 

 a plant, if he has no previous knowledge of botany, or if his eye 

 has never been accustomed to group together natural objects. But 

 such is only the lowest department of botany, and even these dif- 

 ficulties might we hope be obviated by attendance in a class-room.* 

 The principles of the andria and gynia system may be taught in 

 half a dozen lectures, and if the other 50 or 60 of a summer course 

 were to be filled up with disquisitions on the natural arrangement, 

 and illustrations given by arranged plates, and dried or living 

 plants, we have the presumption to think that the students, though 

 at first they might find the plan very dry and unpalatable, would 

 go away with a very superior knowledge of botany, and with an 

 ardour that can never be imparted by the artificial system. 



In the course of the volume before us, we observe that several 

 new species have been added to the British catalogue since Smith's 

 " English Flora" was published. Among these are Fedia mixta 

 and eriocarpa. Crocus mitmnus, (Cr. reticulatus, Sm. not Bieb.) 

 Avena planiculmis, Schrad. (not of the " Flora Scotica," which is 

 A. alpina,) Myosotis collina, (Enanthe apii folia, Statice spathu- 

 lata. Erica ciliaris, Ledum palustre, Rosa Wilsoni, Papaver nudi- 

 caule, Callitriche pedunculata, Hymenophylliim Wilsoni, (which 

 till now Scottish botanists had confounded with H. iunbridgiense, 

 and of which the only existing figure is a wretched one in the 

 trumpery " Promenade de Dieppe aux montagnes d'Ecosse," of Ch. 

 Nodier,) Equisetum Drummondi, Sahx Icevis, and some others of 

 that genus, which we hope are equally good species. In this last 

 genus, however, Ave almost wish our author had disregarded the 

 remarks of Sir J. E. Smith in the " English Flora," and we feel 

 sure that if he had consulted only his own judgment, we might 

 have h^d the whole reduced to fewer species than sixty-six, a num- 

 ber by far too great, unless we look on them as the forms so much 

 written upon by those German botanists, who lay aside the word 

 species until all the forms shall have been described or figured, 

 when they intend to amuse themselves again by combining them 

 into species. This Penelope-web-like entertainment may satisfy 

 the idlers who have perhaps nothing else to do ; but it tortures the 

 science, and we sincerely trust may never be admitted into this 

 country. 



The genera Rosa and Myosotis have been ably written, and Ru- 

 bus also, as far as we can judge, by the laborious and accurate ]\Ir. 

 Borrer ; and we think by the descriptions now given, more British 

 botanists may be tempted to study these difficult tribes. 



* In mathematics synthesis or composition is first taught to the student, and 

 when more advanced geometrical analysis. We wish the same in botany ; the 

 Linnasan is the analytical ; the Jussieuan is tlie synthetical mode. 



