US TUE JOUUXAL OF BOTAXr 



of an interesting paper in Rliodora for November 1916. pp. 225-230. 

 " It is evident," he says, " that in nearly all references to the dedica- 

 tion of the genus JBrickellia two men of identical name were 

 confused, both being presumably from the east of Ireland, both 

 belonging to the same [medical] profession, both having biological 

 interests, and both being authoi-s of papers relating to phases of 

 natural history." Whether the two were related, as seems probable, 

 there is no evidence to show. 



* The earlier John Brickell (fl. 1730-45) was the author of The 

 Natural History of Xorth-Carolina (Dublin, 1737: plants, pp. 57- 

 106) and of a Catalogue of American Trees and Plants icliich loill 

 bear the Climate of England, which I have not been able to see ; we 

 do not remember on what authority we stated (Biogr. Index, p. 22) 

 that it was published in Dublin in 1745— according to AUibone, as 

 quoted by Dr. Kobinson, it was issued in London in 1739. The 

 Natural History is stated by the same authority to have been first pub- 

 lished in 1723, but there is nothing in the 1737 edition to suggest 

 that the AVDrk had previously appeared : its dedication to Vis- 

 count Valentia and its printing ''for the author" in Dublin seems to 

 imply that Brickell was then living in Ireland, probabh^ in the city 

 mentioned. 



Of the later John Brickell (1749-1809), Dr. Robinson's summary 

 may be quoted : " Born in County Louth, Ireland, in or about 1749, 

 [he was] for thirty years resident in Savannah, Georgia, where he 

 died 22 December, 1809, an acute observer of the local vegetation, 

 a man highly respected, author of several medical and botanical com- 

 munications to the then prominent Medicnl Repository of Xew York, 

 a friend of Muehlenberg, Fraser, and of Elliott, who dedicated to him 

 the genus BrickeUia.'''' 



J. B. 



BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, etc. 



The Annals of Botany for October last contains a paper by 

 Dr. E. J. Salisbury on " Variations in Anemone nemorosa " — a 

 subject also dealt with by Dr. Hermann Losch in Berichte der 

 Deutschen Botanischen Gesellschaft (Band xxxiv. Heft 6: July 

 1916). Dr. Salisbury divides the species into three varieties — the 

 first, "the normal type," he names xar. genuina, in accordance with 

 a practice which seems to us to substitute trinomial for binomial 

 nomenclature. The others, var, robu-sta and var, apetala^ whose 

 characteristics are indicated by their names, appear to be rather forms 

 than varieties : the latter, we are told, " bears much the sjime relation 

 to the normal form as Ranunculus auricomus var. depavperata does to 

 R. auricomus itself." But where R. auricomus grows in abundan(?e, 

 flowers in different stages of imperfection occur on the same plant, 

 and individuals with complete blossoms may be foimd in the same 

 patch : in this species the more or less apetalous ])lants seem hardly 

 worth distinguishing even as forms. 



