396 NEW PUBLICATIONS. 



ever, require to be very carefully recorded, and every endeavour should 

 be made to discover the mode in which the seeds, or other means of 

 propagation, were introduced, and this should be accurately stated ; 

 vague expressions, such as " perfectly established," convey, when 

 standing alone, very little definite information. 



In addition to the introductions, the list includes a large number of 

 segregates, the distribution of which is too little known to allow of 

 their treatment according to the full formula. These are Mr. Watson's 

 opprobria. The first forty pages (pp. 421-460) are entirely occupied 

 with an exposition of the impossibility of dealing with the published, 

 records of the localities for such plants, as exemplified in the case of 

 the aquatic Ranunculi, the Dog Violet, and other cases of confused 

 synonymy. Though one cannot help feeling for Mr. Watson in his 

 efforts to reduce to order these tangled records, yet the impression 

 is forced upon us that, as the tojiographical is almost the only 

 aspect in which the confusion of names presents any insurmountable 

 difficulty, our author might have treated with more leniency those who 

 have, in their endeavours to throw light on difficult genera and species, 

 sometimes crossed names, and introduced some unavoidable synonyms. 

 If necessary, it would not be difficult to produce a very confusing 

 series by tracing certain species through the six editions of the 

 ' London Catalogue.' 



The whole additional list occupies (with a brief introduction) pages 

 461-605, and is arranged in the same order as the general synopsis in 

 the two preceding parts. It seems brought down pretty nearly to the 

 present time, and our own pages are laid under frequent requisition, 

 though often insufficiently quoted. The most irapoi'tant omission 

 (among the segregates ?) is CalUtrlche truncata, noticed in this Journal 

 last May (see p. 154). On an average about eight species are treated 

 on a page, and everywhere there is apparent a power of comprehensive 

 condensation, of seeing the real point at issue, and putting it in the 

 fewest possible words, which is really admirable. Yet we could wish 

 that Mr. Watson had taken a little more trouble in the investigation 

 of some of the plants which are shortly disposed of as " ambiguities." 

 There could be no possible difficulty in settling absolutely and at 

 once what was the species found at Granton, and recorded in this 

 Journal as Ilieracium stoloiiijlorum (not " sloloniferum" as Mr. Watson 

 prints it, p. 525) ; and it would have been certainly more satisfactory 



