382 NEW PUBLICATIONS. 
drainage of the country, and taking also into account soil and eleva- 
tion. By this plan, not only have scientific results of an unexpected 
kind frequently accrued, but also practical convenience has resulted ; 
instead of vague generalities, such as that a plant “is very common," 
or “frequent,” it can be definitely stated that it has been found in so 
many and such districts, in such a number of places in one, only occa- 
sionally in another, and that it is unrecorded from a third; moreover 
localities. are more easily arranged, and made available for use. The 
only attempt of this kind in the book before us is the use of the initials 
D. and C. for Devon and Cornwall respectively, and even their utility 
is much destroyed by their being placed after the localities instead of 
prefixed to them. 
Moreover, in elucidating the vegetation of a adr or other district, 
it is of importance scientifically that not only its present, but its past 
Flora be shown. For this purpose the works of the older botanists 
should be consulted, and their plants carefully determined ; no one who 
has not worked with their books can know the accuracy or value of 
their observations. Mr. Keys has done nothing of this sort systema- 
tically for his Flora; not even all the more modern books have been 
quoted throughout. No doubt the amount of matter relating to the 
lora of Devon and Cornwall is very large and much scattered, and its 
complete collation a work of no small labour ; yet this must be done, if 
these counties are to have an exhaustive treatise on their native plants, 
to which great work the present Flora can be only considered as a 
prodromus. 
In a county or district Flora, everything should bear strictly on that 
county or district; e.g. the general habitat, time of flowering, etc. 
should apply to the plant as a plant of the district treated of. Even 
the figures quoted should, when possible, be figures of plants gathered 
in the district. All these matters give a real practical value to the 
Flora as an exposition of the vegetation of the part. We are led to these 
remarks by what we must consider a defect in the book before us: the 
marks used to indicate spontaneous growth or naturalization, instead 
of applying to Devon and Cornwall are simply copied from the ‘Manual,’ 
in which, of course, they refer to the whole of Great Britain. Hence 
they are worse than useless, for it results that such alpine or subalpine 
plants as Trollius Europeus, Arabis petrea, and Silene acaulis, are 
entered without a bracket; and others, such as Draba muralis, Thlaspi 
