BOOKS AND CURRENT LITERATURE 



A Revision of Rhipsalis. — There has just appeared an interesting 

 paper^ wliich forms the first number of a new botanical serial, Arehi- 

 vos do Jardim Botanico do Rio de Janeiro. It is a great satisfaction 

 that the oldest botanical garden in America, established in 1808, pro- 

 poses to pubHsh a high grade botanical journal. The garden, itself 

 one of the most beautiful in the world, can very well be made the 

 center for studying the rich flora of Brazil, although it greatly needs 

 an up-to-date herbarium, more botanical reference books, and expert 

 botanists as assistants. This garden is by all means the best place 

 in the world to study pahus, where so many species are grown in the 

 open. The new Director, Dr. Pacheco Leao, is to be congratulated 

 in this attempt to make the garden more than a local pleasure park. 

 It is to be hoped that he will receive the proper encouragement from 

 the Department of AgTiculture of Brazil, under which the garden is 

 now placed, to make this new venture a success. 



Dr. Lofgren for nearly a generation has been engaged in stud^dng 

 the Brazihan flora, chiefly in helping others, having written in this 

 connection but httle himself. He contributed much material for use 

 in preparing Brazil's great monument in botany, the Flora Brasiliensis. 

 Dr. Lofgren has spent many years on the genus Rhipsalis, of the Cac- 

 tus family, and is undoubtedly the best informed student of the group 

 now hving. The genus itself is a very suitable one to study at the 

 Jardim Botanico do Rio de Janeiro, for this is in the center of its dis- 

 tribution. Of the forty-four Brazilian species, nearly all are to be 

 found in the State of Rio de Janeiro and the adjoining States of Sao 

 Paulo and Minas Geraes. The paper consists of forty-eight pages of 

 text and twenty-five full-page lithographed plates, all beautifully 

 executed. Some of them are not original, being reproduced from 

 plates which appeared in the Flora BrasiHensis and elsewhere. 



While we have nothing but praise for Dr. Lofgren's work, we differ 

 from him when he refers Hariota (now Hatiora) and Pfeiffera as sub- 

 genera of Rhipsalis. It is our opinion also that there are several well 



1 Lofgren, Alberto, O Genero Rhipsalis. Arch. d. Jard. Bot. Rio de Janeiro. 

 1916. 



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