1898] 415 



SOME NEW BOOKS 



The Teaching of Botany: a Contrast 



Elementaky Botany. By Percy Groom, M. A. 8vo, pp. x + 252. With 275 figures. 



London : Bell & Sons, 1898. Price, 3s. 6d. 

 Lessons with Plants. Suggestions for seeing and interpreting some of the common 



forms of vegetation. By L. H. Bailey. With delineations from nature by W. S. 



Holdsworth. 8vo, pp. xxxi + 492. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1898. 



Price, 7s. 6d. 



Me Groom has produced a very serviceable little text-book for 

 beginners in botany. It is an ominous sign that a man trained 

 at Cambridge and writing from the Oxford botanical school should 

 be the author of a botanical book for the proper understanding of 

 which the use of a compound microscope is quite unnecessary. Such, 

 however, is the case, and though, in our opinion, no aid to the impart- 

 ing of knowledge should be despised, we welcome a recognition of the 

 fact that a very great deal may be learned about plants with the help 

 of a sharp penknife and a pocket-lens. The microscope is fascinating, 

 but the beginner is apt to lie bewildered by overmuch detail, and 

 lose sight of the broad principles of general form and function. In 

 recommending this book to teachers of elementary classes, we suggest 

 that an occasional and discreet use of the microscope will be a gain. 



The work, which deals only with seed-plants, falls into the usual 

 three parts — general morphology, classification, and physiology. It is 

 extremely difficult to clothe the bare facts of morphology so as to 

 make them interesting, and Mr Groom fares neither better nor worse 

 than many other authors ; one chapter of the thirteen devoted to this 

 section, that, namely, on pollination, may perhaps be read. For the 

 rest, Part I. excellently fulfils its function as a text-book, that is a 

 complement to the lesson and practical class. Similarly, Part II. is 

 an excellent guide to the study of about thirty of the more important 

 natural orders; but it is a pity to repeat in an elementary book the fable 

 of the ' distinct disc ' in Geraniaceae ; it is as distinct as the perigyny 

 in British Leguminosae. Apropos, also, of the general table of classifi- 

 cation, we notice that the ovary of Liliaceae is said to be inferior — an 

 obvious slip. The same, however, cannot be said of the inclusion of 

 Iridaceae under the head ' flowers actinomorphic ' ; the zygomorphic 

 Gladiolus is so well-known a flower and the second largest genus in 

 the order, that some qualification of the clavis character is advisable. 

 Part III. (Physiology) is somewhat brief, but up-to-date and accurate. 

 Finally, a word of praise is due to tlie profusion of illustrations, which 

 are clear and helpful without being in the least elaborate. 



Perhaps it is hardly fair to compare the second book before us with 

 the one just noticed. Mr Groom's is an elementary text-book, good, 

 but without pretensions to literary excellence or striking originality. 

 Prof. Bailey's is a series of lessons learnt from the plants, but learnt 

 as a child learns, gradually and by intimate association with the 

 objects themselves. And it is also a book to read, for Prof. Bailey 



