NOTICES OP BOOKS, 349 



least, Sir Francis Drake, who had recently returned from his adven- 

 turous voyage round the globe, laden with curiosities from the New 

 World, which he readily shared with I'Escluse, who seems to have 

 been on terms of considerable intimacy with him. The roots of 

 Borstenia Contrajerva, L., were among the curiosities, and I'Escluse 

 figured and described them under the name of Drakena radix (Exot., 

 83), of which M. Morren says, no doubt by a lapsus calami, " qu'il 

 norame Racine du Diahle /" After staying at Cobham Hall, in Kent 

 for favourable weather, and being again delayed at Gravesend for 

 similar reasons, I'Escluse occupied himself in preparing a little work, 

 which issued shortly after from Plantin's press at Antwerp, under the 

 title of *' Aliquod not^e in Garcise Aromaticum Historiam," pp. 43. 



The *'Cruydtboeck" of Dodoens had been translated into 

 French by I'Escluse in 1557, which in its turn had been translated into 

 English by Henry Lyte, a country gentleman, residing at Lytes-Cary, 

 in Somersetshire. Lyte's own copy of the French work is in the 

 British Museum Library, full of notes, corrections, and additions, for 

 the most part in French, in a beautifully neat and regular handwriting 

 which so amended is almost word for word the same as the English ver- 

 sion. It is quite possible that Clusius may have suggested many of these 

 alterations to Lyte personally, but I can find no direct proof of this. 



There is a copy of a French translation, if a compilation may be so 

 called, of the '' Exoticorum " of I'Escluse in the British Museum, and 

 since M. Morren, not having met with it, quotes the work incorrectly, 

 we give it as under : — 



" Histoire des Drogues, espisceries et de certains medicamens 

 simples, qui naissent es Indes et en I'Amerique. . . Seconde edition. 

 Lyon, 1619." 



Also, forming a second part : — 



*'Traicte de Christophle de la Coste m.edicin et chirurgien, des 

 dragues and medicamens qui naissent aux Indes . . . abrige & 

 illustre de quelques notes par Charles de I'Escluse d' Arras. Lyon, 

 1619." ^ 



We can cordially welcome this contribution to the life-history of a 

 man of whom too little is known. B. D. J. 



Icones Muscorimi, or Figures and Descriptions of most of the Mosses 

 peculiar to North America which have not been figured. By the 

 late W. S. SuLLiYANT, LL.D. Supplement, with 81 copper 

 plates. 



Among transatlantic Botanists few have devoted themselves to the 

 study of Mosses, but the name of Sullivant will for ever be associated 

 with this department of science, since no one has bestowed more care 

 on the investigation of species indigenous to his native land. 



His great work, *' Icones Muscorum," with 129 exquisite plates, is 

 a worthy companion to the " Bryologia Europ^ea," and the constant 

 accession of new materials led him to prepare a continuation, on which 

 he was actively engaged at the time of his death in April, 1873. 

 Eighty-one plates had already been engraved, and from the notes 

 left behind, his friend, Mr. Lesquereux, has been enabled to complete 

 the supplementary volume now before us, the text and plates being 



