^7o The Irish Naturalist. Oct., 



AMONG THE WILD FLOWERS. 



Open-Air Studies in Botany : Sketches of British Wild- 

 Flowers in their Homes. By R. Li^oyd Praegbr, B.A., B.E. 

 M.R.I. A. Illustrated by Drawings from Nature by S. Rosamond 

 Praeger, and Photographs from Nature by R. Welch. 8vo, pp. xiii., 

 266. London : Charles Griffin & Co., Ltd., 1897. [Price yj. 6d. ; 

 with gilt top, &c., Ss. 6d.~\ 



One of the most hopeful signs in the present outlook of biological 

 science is the increasing amount of attention that is being paid to out- 

 door work. It is no longer so necessary as it was to insist upon the — one 

 would think — obvious fact that the study of natural history is the study 

 of Itfey and cannot be successfully prosecuted without close and con- 

 tinuous observation of Jiving organisms among their natural sur- 

 roundings. We want to know all that can be known of their life- 

 histories, how they grow and are nourished, their care for their offspring,' 

 their dealings with one another, and their relations with their surround- 

 ings, and a thousand other particulars which cannot be ascertained by 

 examining the dried mummies in a museum, or cutting microscopic 

 slices of bits of tissue. 



As a result of this awakening interest in the doings of the lower 

 organisms, several admirable works on "live" natural history have 

 recently appeared, and Mr. Praeger's charming little volume is a notable 

 addition to the list. In a series of eleven chapters, or ' scenes,' the 

 author conducts his audience to some selected spot by mountain and 

 bog, sea-shore and meadow, river and hedge-row, and discourses pleasantly 

 on the strongly-contrasting assemblages of plants growing in the several 

 situations. Mr. Praeger is thoroughly in sympathy with Nature in all 

 her moods, and his vivid and picturesque descriptions of the natural 

 features of his selected spots afford delightful reading. Some idea of the 

 character of the book may be gathered from the following summary of 

 the subjects treated under the several headings. 



"Scene I." is " A Daisy-starred Pasture" at Ballycastle, Co. Antrim. 

 The various plants in flower are gathered and utilized as material for a 

 very brief outline of the leading facts in the external morphology, 

 physiology, and classification of plants. That these pages are the driest 

 in the book is sa3ang much for the readable character of the rest. No 

 details of minute structure are given, and this omission affords us 

 almost our only opportunity of a mild grumble at the author's expense 

 We are told that a leaf is made up oi cells, but what a cell is we are left to 

 conjecture ; indeed the author uses the term for several totally different 

 structures. For example, on p. 9, the two-chambered ovary of the Hazel 

 is described as two-celled : on p. 47 the huge intercellular spaces in the 

 stems of Reeds are termed " air-filled cells^^ ■ and on p. 194 we are told 



