22 THE JOURNAL OP BOTANY 



authorities such as Dioscorides and Phny, and ready to quote 

 from them, to which opinions da Orta frequently opposes his own 

 experience. 



The first colloquy is concerned with the meeting of the two 

 speakers; after that, the subject-matter of each discourse is usually 

 confined to one drug, as Aloes, Amber, Camphor, Cinnamon, 

 till in the last " Betel and some other things, in which some 

 mistakes throughout the work are amended, which have been left 

 through forgetfulness," as it is naively expressed. 



In 1578 Cristobal Acosta, a medical man of Burgos, published 

 his Tractado de las drogas medicinas de las Indias orientales, 

 Burgos, 4to ; also turned into Latin by Clusius in 1582. The 

 chief source of Acosta's text was the work of da Orta, but he 

 added figures, and these_ cuts, twenty-three in number, have been 

 reproduced in Sir Clement Markham's translation. The determi- 

 nations of the plants mentioned are due to Sir George Birdwood, 

 as already mentioned, to whom the volume is dedicated. It closes 

 with indexes of persons and authorities quoted, of names of drugs, 

 and finally of names of places. 



Many subjects are discoursed of in a simple and entertaining 

 manner, but an attempt to instance any would take us too far, and 

 exceed the space at our disposal. For any one who has a taste 

 for botanical archaeology or the history of pharmacy, the present 

 volume will be a very welcome addition to his bookshelves. The 

 translator deserves the thanks of such for putting at our disposal 

 an English version of one of the rarest volumes on Indian drugs. 



B. D. J. 



BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, &c. 



Messrs. A. Brown & Sons, of Hull, London, and York, 

 announce for publication " an entirely new work bringing the 

 vegetational history of the county quite up-to-date " — The Vege- 

 tation of Yorkshire — by Mr. F. Arnold Lees, which will be issued 

 to subscribers at 12s. Qd. net. The Preface, which is subjoined to 

 the circular announcing publication, is so characteristic of the 

 " free popular style which has always marked the author" that 

 we venture to reprint it : — " Prepared originally, from personal 

 observations and printed records stretching over 25 years, for the 

 Yorkshire Naturalists' Union (who commissioned it), the inability 

 of that body to issue it — the reasons do not concern the present 

 venture — enables the Author and Publisher to unite to give this 

 important work — on the lines of the Botanical Survey, using the 

 three variously up-to-date Floras (Baker's, Lees's, and Kobinson's) 

 as a foundation —a worthier format, and a much wider dissemina- 

 tion than would otherwise be possible. It is no exaggeration to 

 say that in the botanical world this ' Greater Flora ' (J. D. 

 Hooker) has been looked forward to, and its tardy completion 

 urged on, in many wide apart circles, not only in England and 

 Europe, but from New York to the Antipodes. Its subject — 

 essentially an analysis of the wild vegetation of England's largest 



