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HANDBOOK OF SYSTEMATIC BOTANY. 



A Handbook of Systematic Botami. By Dr. E. Warming. With a 

 revision of the Fungi by Dr. E. Knoblauch. Translated and 

 edited by M. C. Potter, M.A., F.L.S. 8vo, pp. xii, 620. 

 With 610 illustrations. London : Swan Sonnenschein & Co. 

 1895. Price 15s. 



Within a few days of the publication of Prof. Vines' Text-hook 

 as a complete work Messrs. Sonnenschein have brought out another 

 book of the same price, and covering to a great extent the same 

 ground. In the Text-book the more advanced student has, what he 

 has been wanting for some years, a modern account of the mor- 

 phology, classification, and physiology of plants, sufficient at any 

 rate to give him a substantial grounding before proceeding to 

 special treatises on the various branches. For fifteen shillings he 

 gets 837 pages. The Handbook of Systematic Botany is smaller by 

 200 pages, and as it is a translation, compares unfavourably as regards 

 cost. Moreover it corresponds only to the systematic portion of the 

 Text-hook, that is to say, devotes its 620 pages to what is disposed 

 of in 450 pages in the other. Here also the difference as regards 

 a fuller treatment is largely confined to the Angiosperms, which 

 occupy 300 and 130 pages respectively in the two books, and this 

 portion we presume supplied the reason for Mr. Potter's work. 

 Handbooks are presumably for the use of students, who will doubt- 

 less consider these points before investing in one which necessarily 

 repeats matter with which they are already acquainted. 



As to the excellency of Dr. Warming's Handbook there can be 

 no doubt, and not a few botanists will be grateful to the translator 

 for the opportunity of reading it in English. For these the chief 

 interest lies in the arrangement of the Thallophytes and Angio- 

 sperms. The former group has been re-arrauged and revised in 

 co-operation with Dr. E. Knoblauch, the editor of the German 

 edition. The Bacteria have been revised by Dr. Migula, the 

 FloridesB re-arranged after the late Dr. Schmitz, and the Taph- 

 rinacere after Dr. Sadebeck. The Alg^ are divided into ten classes, 

 Syngeneticae, Dinoflagellata, Diatomaceffi, Schizophyta, Conju- 

 gatte, ChlorophyceaB, Characete, Phfeophyce^e, Dictyotales, and Piho- 

 dophyceae. Bacteria are included under Schizophyta as colourless 

 Algte. We always pity the student when he comes to the Alg». 

 Considering how difficult it often is to get the plants and to observe 

 them when got, this portion of a text-book is generally most inade- 

 quately illustrated ; Dr. Warming gives a fair number of figures, 

 though many of the plates have got rather worn before reaching the 

 present edition. Then, again, writers are so bewilderingly diverse 

 in their ideas on arrangement, and what is still worse from the 

 student's point of view, may even hold widely different opinions 

 on an examination "type." Protococcus, for instance, according to 

 one possesses plauogametes ; according to another, is satisfied with 

 a purely asexual mode of reproduction. The Handbook gets over 

 the difliculty by dropping it out altogether. We find a family 

 ProtococcoidecB including an order PrutococcacecB, but never a sign of 

 Protococcus. The chapter on " the transition of the Cryptogams to 

 the Phanerogams" is a useful one, but the editor should have 



