PHYSICS AND NATURAL HISTORY OF GENEVA. 279 
M. J. Miter, of the canton of Aargau, presented an important memoir on 
the classification of lichens and on the species of the environs of Geneva. 
The total number of our lichens exceeds 500, which the author enumerates 
and gives the description of 20 new species. The principles of classification 
adopted by M. Miller are analyzed and developed in the forthcoming volume 
of our Memoirs. There can be no doubt that it will attract the attention of 
lichenographers, seeing that this branch of botany has fallen into singular con- 
fusion resulting from the multiplicity of new characters and novel ideas intro- 
duced into it. 
Local botany and descriptive botany scarcely adapt themselves to public 
lectures ; our sessions, therefore, give but an inexact idea of the researches of 
several of our associates in these two departments of the science. I shall 
content myself with mentioning that M. Reuter has published in the course of 
the year a second and much augmented edition of his Catalogue of vascular 
plants of the environs of Geneva, and M. Boissier an important monograph of 
the tribe of the Huphorhie, in the fifteenth volume of the Prodromus. 
De Canbou_e Prize.—The quinquennial prize, founded by A. Pyramus de 
Candolle, for the best monograph of a genus or family of plants, has this year 
claimed the attention of the Society. Contrary to what has heretofore oc- 
curred, our own countrymen have not entered into the competition for it. Two 
memoirs have been received. One of these was from M. de Bunge, professor 
in the University of Dorpat, on the Anabasex, a tribe of the Salsolacez or 
Chenopodiacez. ‘The author having explored the shores of the Caspian sea 
and the interior of Persia, has there discovered several species of these plants, 
and the affluence of the materials at his disposal has enabled him to compile a 
very complete monograph. He has enlarged the number of genera from 
twelve to sixteen, while that of species continues to be sixty, uctwithstanding 
the assignment of fourteen new species. Four charts or tables added to the 
text indicate the geographical distribution and relative affinities of the genera. 
The descriptions, given in Latin, are greatly developed. The second memoir 
was from M. Bayer, inspector in chief of the Austrian railroads. The author 
treats of the genus Jv/za, in relation principally to the numerous modifications 
of specific forms. He has tried a new system of notation, by letters, to ex- 
press the varieties and subvarieties, each letter indicating a certain modification 
of character. This original idea deserves attention under 4 practical point of 
view. It is difficult to devermine whether it would adapt itself to more nu- 
merous genera and to modifications of. very different value which exist in cer- 
tain groups. ‘The jury which you nominated to decide between the com- 
petitors was struck with the value of the two memoirs submitted to them, 
both seeming to deserve high approbation; yet as there was but a single pre- 
mium to award, it was considered that the monograph of M. de Bunge possessed 
superior claims on account of the number of species studied, the difficulty of 
the analysis, and variety of questions examined. The Imperial Academy of 
St. Petersburg, to which the author belongs, has equally appreciated the im- 
portance of his work, and directed it to be inserted in its memoirs. 
‘“‘ PERSONNEL” OF THE SOCIETY. 
Since the last report our regrets have followed to the grave three of our col. 
leagues: MM. Elie Ritter, L. A. Necker de Saussure, and Louis ‘I. I. Col- 
ladon. The first, one of the most active and efficient members of the Society, 
fulfilled, for sixteen years, the exacting functions of secretary. When he re- 
signed that office it was not with a view to withdraw himself from the claims 
of science and of our association; on the contrary, he ceased not to furnish his 
regular tribute of memoirs and communications on the most varied subjects. 
His treatise on the mathematical theory of music, of which I have previously 
spoken, but a little preceded hia death, which occurred March 17, 1862, in the 
