BOTANICAL NEWS. ^ 251 
were read :— 1. On the Arctic Cladonia?. By W. Lauder Lindsay, M.D., etc. 
The Arctic regions include vast level, generally treeless, barren tracts of country, 
whose vegetation is frequently exclusively lichenose; sometimes, indeed, con- 
sisting of a single species, the cosmopolite Cladonia rangiferina. The author 
enumerated the different species and their forms, belonging to the Cladonia, 
found in Arctic countries, and remarked that, whether these may be regarded 
as consisting of many or few species, their importance to man cannot be esti- 
mated by their mere numerical relations ; one species at least (C. rangiferina) 
is not only superior in economical and even political importance to the better- 
known " Orchella weed," but it is even on a footing with the valuable grains, 
timber trees, and other phanerogams of more favoured regions. The author 
considered the economical value and applications of the Arctic Cladonia under 
the following heads : — 1, as fodder or forage to animals, domesticated or wild ; 
2, as an ingredient of man's food ; 3, as medicines, being used as tonics, 
astringents, febrifuges, emetics; 4, in the arts — e.g. perfumery and dyeing. 
2. Recent Regulations regarding the Forest Department of India. By Pro- 
fessor Balfour. Dr. Balfour called the attention of the Society to some par- 
ticulars respecting the selection of candidates for nomination to junior appoint- 
ments in the Forest Department of India. He stated that the candidates, 
after passing a preliminary examination in English, arithmetic, algebra, and 
geometry, were to undergo a regular course of studies and training for three 
? 
years and a half in the natural sciences, in the practice and science of forestry 
and in those branches of surveying and engineering required for the profession 
°f a forest officer in India. The first, or purely scientific part of this course 
of training, will take place in Great Britain. For the second part, comprising 
the instruction in forestry, arrangements are to be made on the Continent, in 
the meantime, until an efficient forest school is established in Great Britain or 
m * ndia - The studies of candidates during the first or scientific part of their 
training is to comprise the following subjects:—!. Mechanical and Natural 
Philosophy.— The elements of mechanics, hydrostatics, hydraulics, optics, heat, 
climate, rain-fall, and the first elements of electricity and magnetism. 2. Che- 
m[str J -—Inorganic— The non-metallic elements and the principal metals. 
Organic— Elements only, with special reference to the chief constituents of the 
vegetable and animal organism, the chemical principles of the process of nutri- 
* 10n , and of respiration in plants and animals ; fermentation, decay, putre- 
faction, destructive distillation. 3. Botany.— Characters of the principal Eu- 
^Pean natural orders. Ability to describe any common phsenogamous plant 
of ordinary structure systematically and with accuracy from a living specimen. 
jf he ele ^entary facts referring to the development and nutrition of plants. 4. 
*»%.— Elementary portions of descriptive geology. 5. Either the French 
0r jhe German Language.— Good colloquial knowledge, with the facility to 
^pand translate into English easy passages taken from the works of some 
ejawical writer. Candidates are at liberty to choose the place of study, but 
lev mus t, before being admitted to the second or practical part of instruction, 
Pa8s an lamination before the Civil Service Commissioners in the branches of 
8Cle &ce, an d i a one of the language8 enumerated above. Candidates who have 
