THE NATUEAL HISTOEY OF CYPEUS. 385 



rapidly gain an equality with tlie first ; and thus in the course of 

 time, structures originally, or in their primaeval forms, produced in 

 succession, will come to be produced simultaneously. 



The general conclusions at which Mr. Spencer arrives, are in 

 brief as follows. The unit of composition of a Phsenogam is such a 

 portion of a shoot as answers to one of the primordial fronds. This 

 is neither a leaf nor an internode, but it consists of a foliar appendage 

 together with the preceding internode, including the axillary bud, 

 when this is developed ; thus Mr. Spencer's " unit" precisely corres- 

 ponds with Gaudichaud's "phyton."* Such an unit being allowed, 

 its metamorphoses are inferable from known laws of development. 

 Arrest of development attacks first those parts which arise last in the 

 order of evolution. On this principle, therefore, the foliar organ is 

 the most constant, the internode less so, the axillary bud still less 

 so, and this gradual degradation we find in a flower ; the bracts are 

 lessened leaves, the internodes are less and less developed, the axil- 

 lary buds are not formed, and in the flower itself we have only a 

 foliar surface, without chlorophyll, and that foliar surface, in the case 

 of the stamen, is reduced to a minimum. 



In conclusion, we beg to express our hope that Mr. Spencer 

 will find time to pursue this interesting subject, and by a more 

 searching investigation of the literature of the subject than he 

 appears at present to have made, and by more abundant personal ob- 

 servations, will add to the obligations under which he has placed 

 botanists by the publication of the present essay. 



XXXIII.— The JSTatural History of Cypeus. 

 Die Insel Cypeeis- iheee physischen uxd oegai^ischen Natur 



NACH, MIT EiiCKSICHT AUF IHEE FEilHEEE GeSCHICHTE GESCHIL- 



dert. Yon Dr. F. linger and Dr. W. Kotschy. Wien, 1865. 

 1 vol. 8vo. 



The work before us may be regarded as an excellent physico- 

 geographical monograph of the island of Cyprus, fuU of valuable 

 details on all branches of natural science. The history and anti- 



* Recherches sur rorganographie des vegetaux. Paris, 1841. See also Hoch- 

 stetter, Jahreshefte des Vereius fiir Vaterlandische Naturkunde in Wiirtemburg , 

 1847, p. 1, 1848, p. 144. 



N.HK— 1865. 2 1) 



