584 



as instances of sheer inadvertences escaping the author's notice both in 

 writing and in correcting the press. As an example of these, we may 

 refer to page 481, where the familiar Oxalis Acetosella has by some 

 mischance got placed in the order of Polygonacese. Of course these 

 trifling blemishes will disappear in a second and revised edition, 

 which we shall hope and expect to see shortly. But enough of opi- 

 nion, we should wish to let the author explain and illustrate himself, 

 by a few extracts, placed before the readers of the ' Phytologist.' 



" In the compilation of this Manual of Botany," writes the author 

 in his preface, "the object has been to give a comprehensive, and, at 

 the same time, a condensed view of all departments of the science. 

 Attention is directed, first, to the elementary structure of plants, and 

 the functions of the simplest tissues, and then to the compound or- 

 gans, and the functions which they perform. In the consideration of 

 these subjects, the works of Jussieu and Henfrey have served as a 

 model. The application of physiology to agriculture, both as regards 

 the cultivation of plants and their diseases, is brought under notice ; 

 the works of Liebig, Mulder and Johnston having been consulted. 

 In the important subject of classification much aid has been derived 

 from the standard work of Lindley. The system adopted is that of 

 De Candolle, but in the arrangement and definition of the natural 

 orders Walker Arnott has been chiefly followed. Many important 

 hints have been derived from Henslow's excellent Syllabus, as well 

 as from the systematic work of Endlicher. In detailing the proper- 

 ties of plants, care has been taken to notice all those which are im- 

 portant in a medical and economical point of view, Christison, Royle, 

 Burnett and Lindley supplying valuable data. In the chapter on the 

 geographical distribution of plants, a very general view is given of 

 the principal facts brought forward by Meyer, Schouw, Humboldt, 

 Berghaus, Watson and Forbes ; and in Fossil Botany the labours of 

 Brongniart, Ansted and Hooker have been made available." 



" The relation which Botany bears to Medicine," we are correctly 

 told in the author's ' Introductory Remarks,' " has often been mis- 

 understood. The medical student is apt to suppose that all he is to 

 acquire by his botanical pursuits, is a knowledge of the names and 

 orders of mediciual plants. The object of the connexion between 

 scientific and mere professional studies is here lost sight of. It ought 

 ever to be borne in mind by the medical man, that the use of the col- 

 lateral sciences, as they are termed, is not only to give him a great 

 amount of general information, which will be of value to him in his 

 after career, but to train his mind to that kind of research which is 



