The Microscope. 165 



this journal will bear witness that for ten years past I have 

 struggled with French microscope makers to add to their in- 

 struments those improvements which make the English and 

 American microscopes the first and best in the world, not only 

 in design, (conception), but in mechanism." Score one more 

 for the Druggist. — F. L. James. 



REVIEWS. 



Text-Book of Structural and Physiological Botany. By Otto 

 W. Thomd, and Alfred W. Bennett. Illustrated with 600 wood- 

 cuts and a colored map. Fifth edition, revised and corrected, 1885. 

 Longmans, Green, & Co., London, England. 



It was about eight years ago that the first edition of this 

 well known text-book was introduced. During these years 

 very great advance has been made in various branches of bo- 

 tanical science. Many of the lower forms have had their life 

 history followed out for the first time; this has made it neces- 

 sary to replace the older classification of the lower cryptogams, 

 as given by Thome, by a system more in keeping with modern 

 research. 



Prof. Bennett seems to accept the recent researches on the 

 " continuity of vegetable protoplasm," at least he speaks of its 

 existence " in some cases, especially in endosperm-cells, in the 

 motile organs of such leaves as those of Mimosa, and in the 

 fronds of many Florideae. Here very delicate threads of pro- 

 toplasm pass through the cell-wall, and maintain a connection 

 between the protoplasmic contents of adjoining cells." He 

 also fully accepts and describes the changes that occur in the 

 nucleus in the course of the division of the cell. This whole 

 chapter on " the cell as an individual " is, we should judge, en- 

 tirely new. Other important changes occur, all aiming to bring 

 the present edition fully abreast of the most recent discoveries 

 and observations. The members of the American Society of 

 Microscopists who had the pleasure of meeting Prof. Bennett, at 

 Rochester, last summer, will surely desire a copy of his latest 

 work, and all botanists will certainly need it. 



