BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, ETC. 279 



Darwiirs very interesting introduetion, which includes a summary of 

 other calendars and a biographical sketch of Blomefield, is dated 

 October 1921. It also contains a disquisition as to " Avhat flower is 

 meant " by " the Cuckoo flower of the older botanists." Sir Francis 

 says " the older botanist (sic) referred to is probably Gerard, and he 

 seems to mean Car da mine pratensis'''' ; the matter, however, can 

 harcUy be doubtful, as both Gerard and Parkinson limit the name to 

 the Gardamine : Wood-sorrel, which " may have been intended with 

 about equal propriety," is called by both Cuckoo's ineaf. Sir Francis's 

 further suggestion "Could it have been the Cuckoo-pint?" maybe 

 dismissed without consideration. In addition to the Calendar itself, 

 there is an " alphabetical arrangement of the periodic phenomena 

 with a reference to the mean date of occurrence." Apart from its 

 interest, the little book is very attractively produced. 



Botany fares badly in Tlie London Naturalist (the Journal of 

 the London Natural History Society) for 1921 (L. Keeve, 85. net). 

 The lleport of the Botanical Section " has been curtailed drasticallv," 

 from motives of economy, and occupies less than half a page : " much 

 important matter has been suppressed or postponed " ; the little that 

 is given mainly relates to excursions of members in Dorset and the 

 Lake District, and can hardly be considered " important." All that 

 we learn about London Botany is that "for the Northern portion, 5 

 new species have been added to the records, and 29 for the Southern : 

 noteworthy among the latter are Silene nutans L. and Mentha 

 (ientilis\^r Three papers on birds and insects, two obituary notices, 

 and a presidential address make up the 95 pages of which the volume 

 is composed. 



Under the heading " The First Liverpool Flora and its Author," 

 Mr. A. A. Dallman in the Lancashire and Cheshire Naturalist 

 for May-June gives a detailed account of Thomas Batt Hall, whose 

 Flora of Liverpool was published in 1839. Hall was born July 25, 

 1814, at Coggeshall, Essex, where he was engaged in the silk trade. 

 In connexion with this he came to Liverpool in 1835-6, and remained 

 until 1839, when he returned to Coggeshall, where, however, things 

 did not go well with him; in 1852, in the hope of bettering his 

 fortunes he went to Melbourne, but the hope was not realised. Failing 

 health and anxiety resulted in acute mental trouble, and he died in the 

 ^'arra Bend Institution on October 26, 1886. His herbarium of 

 mosses and lichens is in the Essex Museum. 



The July number of The Flowering Plants of South Africa 

 contains descriptions and figures of Corycium crispum Sw., Aloe 

 ea-celsa Berger, Gladiolus alatus var. namaqnensis Baker, Gazania 

 pygmwa Sond., G. Pavonia R. Br., Ornithocjaliim Thunherqianum 

 Baker, Ferraria antherosa Ker, Harvey a squamosa Steud., Gladiolus 

 Pritzelii Diels, and Ochna pretoriensis Phillips, sj). n. 



The Bernice Pouahi Bishop Museum publishes in its Memoirs 



(viii. no. 3) an account of The Grasses ofHaioaiihj A. S. Hitchcock 



the result in great measure of an excursion undertaken by him in 

 1906 for the purpose of studying the grasses of the islands. After 

 a general introduction, keys to the tribes and genera are given, 



