24 THE JOURNAL OF BOTANY 



a little volume on Elementary Tropical Agriculture (Crosby Lock- 

 wood, 3s. 6d. net), which will it is hoped also prove useful in other 

 tropical countries. It deals simply and clearly with the various 

 parts of a plant, with chapters on soil, food, fungoid diseases and 

 insect pests ; a second part is concerned with the school garden 

 and various matters connected with cultivation. There are twenty 

 useful illustrations, and the book is admirably printed. 



Mr. A. Bruce Jackson has printed for private distribution, at 

 the request of the Duke of Northumberland, A Catalogue of Hardy 

 Trees and Shrubs groiving at Alhury Park, Surrey — a companion 

 volume to that on the trees of Syon House, published in 1910 and 

 noticed in our volume for that year (p. 296). The book is 

 divided into two parts, one dealing with the " gardens," the other 

 with the " woods " ; this necessitates a certain amount of repeti- 

 tion, and we should have thought the two might well have been 

 combined, indicating by a prefixed initial which plants were found 

 only in one or other of the divisions. The list has evidently been 

 done with much care, and is very nicely printed ; we note very few 

 slips — "Phillyr(^a" (p. 25) — is one. There are brief but useful 

 notes ; references to important works are given ; and a short 

 history of the estate is given as a " foreword." 



Dr. Henry Franklin Parsons, who died at Croydon, Surrey, 

 on the 14th October, was an excellent " all-round " botanist. 

 Born at Frome, Somerset, in 1846, of a large family, more than 

 one member of which are well known in the world of art, he 

 graduated in medicine with distinction in the University of 

 London. His assistance in the Flora of his native county is 

 acknowledged by its author and a manuscript list of plants 

 observed by him is preserved in the Taunton Museum. Appointed 

 Medical Officer at Goole, he paid considerable attention to the 

 Yorkshire Flora, contributing a paper on maritime plants to the 

 Naturalist in 1875, drawing up botanical reports for the Natura- 

 lists' Union for 1877 and 1878, and assisting Dr. Lees with his 

 Flora (1888). Becoming Medical Inspector to the Local Govern- 

 ment Board in 1879, a post which he held for thirteen years when 

 he became Assistant Medical Officer, he devoted much of his 

 leisure to the Croydon Natural History and Scientific Society, of 

 which he became a Vice-President. In addition to geological and 

 meteorological papers he contributed to its Transactions papers 

 on the times of flowering of spring flowers (1897), on the flora of 

 the commons near Croydon (1899, 1902), and on London casual 

 plants (1906), and gave educational addresses to sections of the 

 Society on hepatics, lichens, and other topics. He conducted 

 many of their excursions and fungus forays, drawing up careful 

 reports of the species observed, and also communicated an annual 

 report on the weather in its relation to local vegetation down to 

 1912. He retired from the Local Government Board in 1911. 

 For many years Dr. Parsons had also acted as examiner in sani- 

 tary science for the University of Cambridge. His herbarium has 

 been bequeathed to the Somersetshire Archaeological and Natural 

 History Society, and is placed in the Taunton Museum. 



