LINNEAN SOCIETY OF LONDON. XXV 



Hermann Mueller himself proves to be an equally persevering and 

 indefatigable collector of facts, having for the present purpose the 

 great advantage of being evidently as well versed in entomology as 

 in botany. It appears also that he has been already assisted by his 

 son Hermann. As far as a hasty glance over the work enables me 

 to judge, the principal general facts here first brought prominently 

 into notice appear to be, the variety of insects which visit the same 

 floAvers, the variety of flowers visited by the same insects, and the 

 number of flowers which an insect, deceived by false appearances, 

 visits in search of what is not to be found, all much greater than had 

 hitherto been supposed. 



Besides the methodical record of all the facts he has been able to 

 collect from German, Italian, Swedish, and British literature, H. 

 Mueller commences with a short historical introduction, in which he 

 does full justice to his predecessors, and concludes with some general 

 considerations of a' remarkably sober character. He justly criticises 

 the fanciful flights of Delpino's imagination, to which I have myself 

 aUuded in former Addresses, and AxeU's theory that the develop- 

 ment of the fertilizing arrangements in Phanerogams has been 

 ahvays an advance, and still continues to advance, in one and the 

 same direction towards perfection ; and, as far as I can see, his 

 own conclusions are none but what are fairly deducible from the 

 facts he records. 



With this book in hand, I cannot but strongly recommend the 

 further pursuit of an inquiry still in a very early stage, to all 

 naturalists residing in the country, and especially to those who may 

 be located in regions which, like the Mediterranean, the South 

 African, the South-west Australian, the subtropical and extra- 

 tropical South American, and the Mexican, appear to maintain at 

 once a great variety of locally restricted endemic plant-races, and a 

 great number and variety of flower-seeking insects, in order that we 

 may ascertain how far these two great supposed facts are confirmed 

 by direct observation, and how far they may mutually have influ- 

 enced each other. 



The present state of physiological and anatomical botany, with 

 reference especially to its recent progress in Germany, is admirably 

 expounded in the third edition of Julius Sachs's ' Lehrbuch der 

 Botanik,' of which I am happy to learn that Mr. A. W. Bennett has 

 promised us an English edition. As a repertory of the results of the 

 laborious investigations which have been carried on of late years, 

 and reported in a great variety of scattered, often inaccessible, pub - 



LINN. PEOc. — Session 1872-73. d 



