86 ERYTHEA. 



siou of knowledge; it is, therefore, a business, not a science." [Mac- 

 Millau, New York. SI. 25.] 



M. Charles Naudin describes in the Bulletin de la Societ'e 

 Nationale D^Acdvnation de France, for June, 1898, p. 177, ii 

 liybrid between two distinct species of Campanula, C. isophylhi 

 and C. fragilis, the cross having been made by an English horti- 

 culturist, AVilliam Mitten. The hybrid is said to be most remark- 

 able; not only is it not intermediate between its parents, but its 

 characters are such as to exclude it from the Campanulacete and 

 constitute a new genus. Briefly the characters of the flower are 

 as follows: The normal calyx is replaced by a verticil of five 

 petioled leaves, with large blades, having all the appearance of 

 other leaves of the plant ; in the center of this verticil is the sym- 

 petalous corolla, conforming to tlie normal type and bearing five 

 stamens, and most singular of all, the ovary is entirely free. The 

 hybrid has been named Campanula Balchiniana by Mr. Mitten. 



The books and papers written by Rafinesque, including those 

 of botanical leanings, have in recent years become very scarce. 

 For the conchologist, his conchological writings were several years 

 ago reprinted, and for the ichthyologist the same thing has now 

 been done for his account of the fishes of the Ohio. A reviewer in 

 the Nation, with the latter reprint as a topic, acknowledges that the 

 paper lies at the foundation of the investigation of the fresh -water- 

 fishes, but comments upon the mythical species added through the 

 practical jokes of Audubon and the "torment citused to the syste- 

 matic naturalist by Rafinesque's ill-digested, imperfect, and latterly 

 more or less irrational work," and adds : " We have not yet heard 

 that any meteorologist has reproduced the tract in which this half- 

 crazy systematist described a large number of genera and species of 

 thunder and lightning." However, we should be glad to see 

 Rafinesque's botanical writings reprinted and made generally 

 accessible. It would at once produce a reaction against an 

 acceptance of Rafinesquian names in botany. 



Bulletin No. 4 of the New York Botanical Garden, in addition 

 to various official reports, contains several "botanical contributions," 



