NOTICES OF BOOKS AND MEMOIRS. 55 



EicciA SPURIA, Dickson. — The correct determination of this 

 plant has long been a desideratum, as no specimens were known to 

 be in any collection ; and the figure in Dickson's work (fasc. iv. 

 tab. xi. fig. 16) represents a form of fructification so cmious and 

 distinct fi-om that of Bkcia that it became a matter of great interest 

 to identify the plant. Guided by this figm-e, and by his knowledge 

 of foreign species. Prof. Lindberg, in his paper " Hepaticse in 

 Hibernia m. Julii, 1873, lectae " (pp. 479, 480), published his opinion 

 that it was probably referable to the same genus as Syjihymenium 

 aureonitens, Griff. The acquisition of Dickson's herbarium by 

 the British Museum having afforded an opportunity of examining 

 the original si)ecimen, he is enabled fully to confirm the accuracy 

 of his iDrevious conjecture. Griffith's plant is congeneric with 

 Cyathodium cavernaruin, Kunze, only known hitherto from the West 

 Indies and Cape Verd Islands ; Riccia spuria, Dicks., is this species, 

 and although Dickson merely says, " in paludibus turfosis montium 

 Scoticarum," Prof. Lindberg considers it quite x^ossible that it is 

 a native, as the western coasts of Great Britain and Ireland have 

 several Cryptogams in common with the "West Indies. He states 

 that the plant is smaller and more scattered and the spores less 

 perfectly developed than in the Cape Verd specimens. 



The synonymy of the two species which constitute the genus 

 will stand as follows : — 



1. Cyathodium spurium, Lindb. 



Fdccia spuria, Dicks. Plant. Crypt. Brit. fasc. iv. p. 20, and 

 tab. xi. fig. 16 (1801). 



Cyathodium cavernaruin, Kimze in Lehm. Pugill. Plant, vi. 

 p. 17 (1834). 



Figured also in Montague, Ic. Plant, in Flor. Cub. De- 

 script, t. xix. fig. 4 (1863). 

 Hah. Scotland, Cape Verd Islands, Cuba, Mexico. 



2. Cyathodium aureonitens, Lindb. 



Synhymeniurii aureonitens, Griffith, Notulse ad Plant. Asiat. i. 

 p. 344 (1847), and t. Ixix. D, fig. 2. 

 Hab. India. 



Attention is called to this very interesting plant in the hope 

 that botanists will search for it in Scotland, and that it will be 

 again detected there. — R. Braithwaite. 



Notuts of 53oofts antr iltanotts. 



Die Parthenogenesis der Calebogyne ilicifolia. Von Johannes Hanstein. 



(Hanstein's Botanische Abhandlungen, dritter Band, drittes 



Heft). Bonn, 1877. 

 The whole tendency of this memoir is to support the supposition of 

 pai-thenogenesis. Every possible precaution was taken to isolate the 



