S74: THE JOURNAL OF EOTANT 



familiar example — these apparently date back to the fourteenth 

 century and had become popular by the sixteenth. One of the best 

 known was that made about 1560 for Lord Burliigh at Theobalds in 

 Hertfordshire ; that at Hattield House— of this a photograph, taken 

 from the roof of the house, stands.as frontispiece to the book — is one 

 of the finest examples. The volume, which is very carefully compiled, 

 ends with a full bibliography and an excellent index. 



The Transactions of the South-Eastern Vnioii of ScientiHc 

 Societies for 1922 contains an exceedingly interesting presidential 

 address by Miss A. Lorrain Smith on " The History of Lichens in the 

 British Isles." The first allusion to a lichen ( JJsnea) is in The 

 Grete Herhall (1526), the next (Loharia) in Turner's Herhall 

 (1568) ; after this references became increasingly frequent until 

 lichens took something like their proper place in British botanical 

 works. Miss Smith's short account of our lichenologists down to the 

 present time is exceedingly well done, selecting points of interest for 

 comment; the usefulness of her references is increased by appending 

 to the name of each author the dates (when known) of his birth 

 and death. The initials of authors are occasionally given incorrectly — 

 e. g. AV. M. [H.J Leighton and W. [J.] M. Crombie ; and it was not 

 Sir Thomas Gage of Hengrove [Hengrave] Hall but his brother, who 

 introduced and gave his name to the greengage. 



Mr. J. H. Maiden's useful but extravagantly printed Critical 

 Revision of Eucalyptios has reached its 56th part; it contains 

 descriptions of nine species, four of which are new, and an essay on 

 " Diels's Law," which Mr. Maiden derives from Diels's Jugendform 

 unci Blutenreife im Pflanzenreich (1906). This, he says, may be 

 conveniently expressed by stating that *'the generative maturity of 

 plants is not connected with a definite stage of theii- development . . . 

 A vegetative and juvenile form and a vegetative full-grown form can 

 existln a single species, and each form flowers and fruits, and forms 

 {sic) a perfectly closed cycle of life." Mr. Maiden has noticed the 

 "Law" in so many species of Eucalyptus that he thinks it will 

 probably be observed eventually in all. 



The Bulletin of the Torrey Club for October contains a mono- 

 graph of the Central American species of Costus by AV. W. Kowlee, 

 in which three new species are described and figured, and an hiteresting 

 note on " References to the Alg® in the Chinese Classics," by W. M. 

 Porterfield ; " from this discussion," says the author, '_' we begin to 

 realise that'from direct references in ancient Chinese literature and 

 an analysis of the ideograph [the Chinese character for algse] there is a 

 possibility, if not a probability, that the knowledge of the algaj as 

 a distinct morphologic unit in the plant kingdom dates back to very 

 early times, as compared with the state of knowledge in western 

 countries." 



In Torrey a (Sept.-Oct.) Mr. F. W. Pennell continues the re- 

 searches into Rafinesque's Anti'kon Botanikon to which we referred 

 last year (p. 184) when noticing the Bulletin of the Torrey Club. 

 He now reproduces Rafinesque's names for Scrophulariacecs, thus 

 disinterrincj manv which might well have remained in obscurity. 



