REVIEWS AND CRITICISMS. 177 



acceptable both to those botanists who are critical and to teachers, 

 who are required or expected to take charge of nature -study in the 

 primary schools. The author's style fits well her subject; she 

 writes most easily and charmingly of "Some Plants that lead easy 

 Lives," "How some Plants begin Life," "Plants that know how 

 to meet Hard Times," "Some Plants that do not make their 

 own Living," "After the Rains," "The Awakening of the Trees," 

 "Plants with Mechanical Genius," "Plants of High Rank," and 

 many such topics. Some of the titles and some of the phrases are 

 indeed, somewhat Grantallenesque, but the edged tools of metaphor 

 and of simile Mrs. Davidson handles with considerable caution 

 and judgment. 



Although the sub-title reads "A Botanical Reader for Children," 

 the book is more than this^and has something of the character of a 

 manual. The "Supplement for the Use of Teachers," 133 pages, 

 is very full of directions, suggestions, and hints for each of the fore- 

 going chapters. Finally, there is an outline of topics for eight 

 grades. We very much doubt if many teachers will be disposed to 

 take up the study of algae, oxygen, carbonic acid gas, protoplasm 

 and cell, in the fourth grade, or grant the expediency of such a 

 course, but we have no doubt that the treatment as a whole will be 

 found sufficiently elastic to meet all local needs. — w. l. j. 



P/ant Relations. A First Book of Botany. By John M. Coulter 



Ph. D., Head Professor of Botany in the University of Chicago. 



[D. Appleton & Co., New York.] 



The term "newer botany" is associated in our mind with a certain 



sort of twaddle in speech and writing; but for this we should like 



to apply the phrase in its best sense to a bright, vigorous text-book, 



the best of the year, entitled a " First Book in Botany," by Prof. 



J. M. Coulter. 



Briefly this book is an account of the fundamental characters of 

 plants from the standpoint of general physiology or ecology, and 

 viewing the plant largely as a whole or individual. In the first 

 chapters, however, the leaf, the shoot, and the root are considered 

 separately in relation to the simpler features of structure, of physi- 

 ology, of light, soil, and other factors, and is followed by an account 

 of reproductive organs, flowers and insects, and of nutrition. In the 



