1904] CURRENT LITERATURE Kes 
benzine and benzol; the term ‘‘ benzine” is (correctly) used on page 110 to. 
designate the petroleum product. On page 195 gum arabic and the gums of 
peach and cherry trees are mentioned as typical examples of gums. In the 
next line is the statement: ‘When treated with dilute acids the gums are 
converted into dextrose sugars and acid products.” The gums mentioned as 
examples all give pentose sugars and not dextroses. Page 201: “Beeswax, 
for example, is composed of palmitic and ethyl radicals.” The chief con- 
stituent of beeswax is myricyl palmitate, not ethyl palmitate. The whole of 
page 20 is devoted to description of plates I and II. On page 267 plate III 
is mentioned. There are no plates in the book. On page 406 there is a 
table of “ Corrections ;” but no such errors exist on the pages indicated. 
In spite of some faults, there is a judicious selection of subjects, and in 
the applied part of the book aclear and concise treatment of the matter pre- 
sented, While the book is not recommended as a text for elementary chem- 
istry, the applied portions should prove very useful to students of agriculture, 
and interesting to all who, having an elementary knowledge of chemistry, are 
concerned in the subject of plant and animal nutrition.— H. N. McCoy. 
The Bonn text-book. 
THE FACT that this book,3 addressed to college students, has reached its 
sixth edition in ten years is ample evidence of its popularity. One notices at 
once the name of Dr. G. Karsten instead of the late Dr. A. F, W. Schimper, 
who wrote the chapters on phanerogams for the previous editions. As before, 
the first three sections on morphology, physiology, and cryptogams, are 
treated by Strasburger, Noll, and Schenck respectively. In these three sec- 
tions the sequence of topics and the method of treatment are practically the 
Same as in the fifth edition, the principal revision appearing in the changes 
which have been necessary in order to keep the work fully abreast with recent 
contributions. 
In the section on morphology the new figures and perhaps the most 
extensive revision of the text concerns the central cylinder of vascular plants. 
In the section on physiology the chapter on the «Stability of the plant body” 
has received a much more extended treatment than heretofore. More atten- 
tion has also been given to ecology. In the cryptogams several new figures 
have been added, and slight changes, occasioned by recent studies, appear in 
the text. ae 
In the treatment of the phanerogams one cannot speak of revision, for 
the entire section has been rewritten by Dr. G. Karsten. The gymnosperms 
receive more attention than previously. The arrangement of the angiosperms 
is practically that followed in Engler and Prantl’s Pflanzenfamilien. By 
abbreviating the diagnoses of orders and families, Professor Karsten has 
STRASB r, E., Nout, F., SCHENCK, H., and KarsTEN, G., Lehrbuch der 
Botanik fiir Hochschulen, 6th ed. Imp. 8vo. pp. vili+ 591. Ags. 74/- Jena: Gustav 
Fischer, 1904. Mf 7.50. , 
