834 THE JOURNAL OF HOT ANT 



cliaraoters. Similavh^ Weismalin's theory of germinal continuity, 

 wliich is in general agreement with the results of biological work 

 to-day, was hampered by association with the theory of germinal 

 selection, devised in order to explain variation. In the following 

 chapttjr the difficult question of the inheritance of acquired characters 

 is discussed, the conclusion reached being that, whereas the bulk of 

 available evidence seems to be against such inheritance, there are a 

 number of biological facts that seem difficult to explain in any other 

 way. In the six succeeding chapters Mendel's law and its modern 

 development, or neo-Mendelism, are lucidly explained, and the 

 avithors have made good use of simple diagrams to illustrate the 

 mechanism of the operations. The student will admire the ingenuity 

 with which difficulties have been overcome by an increasing complica- 

 tion of the working machinerj^ but wiW be inclined to look forward 

 with some foreboding to further developments. Two points of diffi- 

 cultv which arise are discussed in the chapters x. and xi. — namely, the 

 possibilities of non-Mendelian inheritance and of moditication of unit 

 characters, both fundamental points on which- there is difference of 

 opinion. The remaining chapters deal with certain phenomena which 

 are of special interest in the study of plant genetics. In a discussion 

 on parthenogenesis and vegetative apogamy stress is laid on the want 

 of observation and conti'ol of the events between pollination and 

 fertilization, and fertilization and the subsequent escape of the 

 embryo, and the desirability is emphasized of a study of the 

 lower forms where the gametophyte is obvious and the effects of 

 fertilization can be more readily followed. In this connection it may 

 be remembered that an account of some extremely interesting work 

 on the Mosses has been recently given at a meeting of our Linnean 

 Society. Other matters treated are self-sterility, the endosperm in 

 inheritance, involving an explanation of the phenomenon originally 

 described as xenia, hybrid vigour, and sex-determination. The little 

 volume will be welcomed by students and teachers of botany, who 

 have felt the want of a satisfactory presentation of the present posi- 

 tion of plant genetics. 



A. B. II. 



BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, etc. 



Workers in Cryptogamic botany, who have used the collections 

 in that section of the Department of Botany at the Natural History 

 Museum, will hear with regret of the death at his home in Fulhum, on 

 Se])tember 6, of William Eobert Carter, Avho had been associated 

 with the Department since its reorganization at South Kensington. 

 He was born in Marylebone, Feb. 25, 1860, and joined the staff in 

 1880, as an Attendant when the collections were on the point of 

 being transferred from the old building in Bloomsbury to their 

 new home in Cromwell Road. Mr. George Murray was in charge of 

 the Cryptogamic section, and Carver was his right-hand man in the 

 arrangement of the collections and in the building up of the new Her- 

 barium in its more commodious quarters. Until two years ago, when 

 he Avas temporarily lent (under heavy pressure) to the Ministry of 

 Munitions, Carver was closely identified with the Cryptogamic Her- 



