376 BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, ETC. 



official pressure and repeated promises, its coutiuuatiou seems as 

 far off as ever, although the necessity for a Tropical African flora 

 becomes more and more pressing every year. It is to be regretted 

 that the energy which is so conspicuous in certain departments of 

 work at Kew Gardens does not extend to the publications for which 

 that establishment is responsible. 



We have already briefly referred (p. 2B9) to the continuation of 

 the iilora Capensis, which, after remaining for thirty-one years in 

 abeyance, has at last seen the light. This sixth volume begins the 

 Monocotyledons, vols. iv. and v. being left for the completion of the 

 Dicotyledons. The most noteworthy feature of this instalment — 

 which, save for the short introductory note by Dr. Dyer, is entirely 

 the work of Mr. J. G. Baker — is the small number of novelties it 

 contains : in the 192 pages we note only eleven new species, four of 

 which belong to Ih/podis. The breaking up of the area into some- 

 what arbitrary regions is a perhaps desirable innovation on the 

 preceding volumes ; we regret that the opportunity was not taken 

 of omitting the brackets in which the authority for each name is. 

 placed — "G. ochroleucus (Baker in Jouru. Bot. 1876, 182)" — as 

 this mode of printing is now seldom employed, and indeed has a 

 somewhat different signification. The recent Kew plan of printing 

 adjectival names derived from persons with a small letter — 

 " forsythiana " — which is in direct defiance of the Decandollean 

 " Laws " as well as contrary to general practice, has, we regret to 

 see, been adopted : for this we presume Dr. Dyer is responsible, 

 notwithstanding his dictum (see p. 114) that "changes should never 

 be insisted on without grave and solid reason." 



We are glad to find that our surmise as to the extinction of 

 Erijthea (see p. 280) was incorrect, as we have since received the 

 monthly numbers — some of them very small ones — up to July of 

 the present year. These contain notes and novelties of varied 

 interest, as well as examples of the amenities of controversy as 

 conducted by our transatlantic friends. The editor notes that "the 

 Editor of the Loudon Journal of Botany [is there any other periodical 

 bearing this title ?] has had nothing to say for several months about 

 'Neo- American' nomenclature." This is an error; we have had 

 plenty to say, although we have not said it. When American 

 botanists show some signs of agreement among themselves, we shall 

 be prepared to discuss their decisions. Meanwhile Mr. Jackson's note 

 in our present issue will show that the subject is not lost sight of. 



The copy of Eees's Cijdopadia on which Mr. Jackson's notes, 

 printed on pp. 307-311, were based, has been presented by him to 

 the General Library of the Natural History Museum. 



Messrs. Marcus Ward & Co. have published in a neat portfolio 

 forty coloured pictures of some common Plants of Manitoba. There 

 is no letterpress beyond a list of the species figured, and it is not 

 easy to see the object of the publication, nor to discover to whom 

 such a collection will be of use, although, as such things go, it is 

 not dear at half-a-guinea. No author's name is associated with 

 the work. 



