239 



BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, dc. 



The University of Glasgow has conferred the honorary degree of 

 LL.D. upon Mr. Dyer. Glasgow folk seem unaware of Mr. Dyer's 

 claims to this distinction ; the Keening Citizen of April 4th says : — 

 " Mr. Thistleton (.s/r) Dyer, of Kew Botanic Gardens, has consider- 

 able standing in horticultural circles, but the likelihood is that he 

 was first heard of outside of these a week ago, when he was taken 

 somewhat savagely to task, in the columns of the Saturdaij llevieu-, 

 for his policy of uprooting many of the clumps of trees with which 

 the Gardens are studded." Buch is fame ! 



We learn from Madras papers that the late Mr. M. A. Lawson, 

 whose death we recorded last month, formed a very good herbarium 

 at Ootacamund, which will probably be removed to Madras. He 

 did much to re-establish the Government cinchona plantations on 

 the Nilgiris, and succeeded in establishing a system by which 

 quinine could be sold in the villages at a very cheap rate — an 

 object which he had had in view for many years before its ac- 

 complishment was possible. Mr. Lawson was born at Seaton 

 Carew, Co. Durham, on Jan. 20th, 1840. 



Tee last part (vol. iv. pt. 2) of the Transactions of the Natural 

 History Society of Glasgow contains papers on the occurrence of 

 Cladium jamaicense in Bute, by J. Ballantyne ; on the Flora of 

 Palestine, by the Eev. H. Macmillan ; on the Botany of the West 

 of Scotland, by P. Ewing ; on Cystopteris montana in Stirlingshire, 

 by A. Somerville ; on Measurements of Trees, by R. M'Kay and J. 

 Renwick (two plates) ; and other botanical notes. We note that 

 another botanical "Dr. Robert Brown" takes part in the pro- 

 ceedings of the Society. 



We are glad to announce the issue of vol. vi. part 1, of the 

 continuation of the Flora Capensis. Dr. Dyer, who undertook to 

 edit the work in 1872, is to be congratulated on this result of his 

 labours, of which we hope to speak more at length on a future 

 occasion. This part contains the IridecB and the beginning of the 

 AmaryllidecB, and is entirely the work of Mr. J. G. Baker. 



The third part of Dr. Bretschneider's valuable and learned 

 Botanicon Sinicuin (Hongkong and Singapore, Kelly & Walsh) has 

 just reached us. It is devoted to "botanical investigations into 

 the materia medica of the ancient Chinese," and forms a volume of 

 over 600 pages. 



The Gardeners' Chronicle for April 25th has a long notice of the 

 collection of water-colour drawings of Australian plants by Mrs. 

 F. C. Rowan, now on exhibition at Messrs. Dowdeswell's Galleries 

 in Bond Street. " Many of the plants," says the Chronicle, "are 

 new to botanists, and come from parts of Australia hitherto not 

 trodden by the white man"; and the preface to the catalogue states 

 that they have been " obtained at great personal risk, and nearly 

 always under most trying circumstances." The drawings are very 

 beautiful, and merit the praise bestowed upon them. The Chronicle 



