284 NOTICES OF BOOKS. 



Selinum Caevifolia in Cambeidgeshire. — A specimen of this 

 plant was brought to me on August 10th, by my nephew, Mr. W. J. 

 Cross, of Ely, a diligent young botanist who often consults me 

 upon his "finds." He had collected it on swampy land near 

 Foulham, Cambridgeshire, where I subsequently found it growing 

 in considerable quantity, with such plants as Aivjelica sylvestris, 

 Vicia Cracca, Lythncui Salicaria, Lotus major, Jioiais ejf'iisus, &c. 

 There can, 1 think, be no doubt that it is indigenous here. The 

 plant bears a general resemblance to Peucedaniim paJiistre, but the 

 sharply ribbed stem at once distinguishes it. — W. Marshall. 



Mr. F. A. Lees sends the following note on the locality h-om 

 which S. Curi'ifolia was first reported (see p. 129): — "Last month 

 Mr. Fowler and I visited the Broughton Wood locality for further 

 observation. We found the plant over a considerable area, many 

 acres, growing both amongst pasture grass of a rushy damp 

 character and amongst bushes, in the thickets towards the edge of 

 the pool, on sloping ground, above which it mainly occurs. There 

 is a keeper's lodge not above three hundred yards from the spot, 

 but the lodge is a newly built one, and the Selinum must have been 

 growing where now found for some fifty years at least for it to have 

 spread so. The parts of Broughton Wood above the pool are 

 planted, doubtless ; but the trees are fine and large oak, beech, 

 ash, birch, larch, &c., of fully seventy or eighty years' growth. 

 About the pool are clearings and spaces of rough open pasture. 

 In the drier parts of slope Selinum grows about 18 inches to 2^ feet 

 high, with Silaus, Geranium sanguineum, Gijmnadenia covojjsea, 

 Kieleria, &c. ; in the rushy pasture with Blijsnms comjyressiis, Juncus 

 acutifolius, Carduus yratensis, and Serratula ; in the bushy damp 

 places with Tlialictrum jiavum, Spircea Ulmaria, Eujjatorium. ^Lnd 

 Lijsimachia vuhjaris ; here attaining a height of 4 feet, coming on to 

 flower only in mid-July." — F. A. Lees. 



Nottcts of BooRs< 



Vegetable Technology;^ a Contribution towards a Bibliography oj 

 Economic Botany, with a comprehensive subject Index. By 

 Benjamin Daydon Jackson, Secretary of the Linuean Society. 

 London : Published for the Index Society. 1882. 



The first thing to consider regarding a new book is, whether 

 there is really any reason for it to have been written, — that is, 

 whether it supplies an absolute want, as of course every author 

 believes his own production to do. At the present day there is far 

 too much inclination to produce books without considering whether 

 they are needed or not. Works of reference, however, difier from 

 the ordinary run of books ; anything that will help us promptly to 

 arrive at the information we may be seeking on. any given subject 

 is a boon ; and though all such works may be more or less useful, 

 there is a scale of utility under which they may be classified. 

 Mr. B. D. Jackson's volume may be said to be a first attempt at 



