128 THE PLANT WORLD. 



On June 25, 1897, I collected the _Yellow-fruited Sedge [Carex 

 xanthocarpa Bicknell) here. Mr. E. P. Bicknell tells me this is the 

 westernmost record so far as he knows. The range given in the books 

 is "Massachusetts to New York and Ohio." — l^irginius H. Chase, 

 IVady Pctra, 111. 



BOOK REVIEWS . . 



Catalogue of North American Plants North of Mexico, Exclusive 

 OF THE Lower Cryptogainis. By A. A. Heller; paper, small 8 vo., 

 pp. 160. Published by the author, March 10, 1898; price 60c. 



The publication, as complete as it is possible to make it, of a cata- 

 logue of the North American flora, is a welcome book. The last at- 

 tempt of similar scope was Patterson's " Check-List," the latest edition 

 of which was printed in January, 1892. That list included 12,794 spe- 

 cies and varieties ; the present catalogue embraces 14,534 forms, the 

 great int rease being the measure of activity in systematic botany dur- 

 ing the six years between the two lists. The families are arranged 

 in the Engler and Prantl sequence and the nomenclature is in accord 

 with the rules adopted by the Botanical Club of the A. A. A. S. The 

 book is well printed on strong paper, and the remarkably low price, 

 which is really the actual cost of publication, should place it in the 

 hands of all working botanists. — F. H. K. 



A Laboratory Manual of Practical Botany. By Charles H. Clark; 



pp. 271. New York: American Book Company. 



Good laboratory manuals of botany are already numerous, yet the 

 little work before us possesses some features that recommend it. 

 Logically, the study of botany should begin with the slowest and sim- 

 plest forms and pass on to the relatively more and more complex, but 

 in the case of students who have had little or no previous training it 

 is often difficult to do this successfully. These minute forms of plant- 

 life are so wholly unfamiliar that it is impossible to correlate them 

 with the ordinary familiar forms. To obviate this difficulty the author 

 has a chapter of preliminary studies which begin with the higher or 

 flowering plants and pass hastily in review the whole vegetable king- 

 dom. Then follows the main portion of the book, in which the various 

 types, beginning with the simplest, are studied with considerable 

 thoroughness. The student is required to work out the life-histories 

 as fully as possible for himself, and in the hands of a competent teacher 

 the book will prove very useful. The illustrations are in the main 

 copied from standard works; a few are original and not always satis- 

 factory. The paper and printing are all that could be desired in a book 

 of this kind— /^. H. K. 



