282 REVIEWS. {September, 



The title of the work, the preface and the contents, are printed 

 on a folio sheet with a fly-leaf, and the specimens follow, from 

 no. 1 to no. 49, viz. " Equisetum arvense, L., Acker-schachtelhalm, 

 Sand- und Lehmacker ; gemein. Marz, April. Bei Gorlitz, von 

 B. gesammelt.'^ This or similar information is printed on each 

 ticket, and the above may be rendered: — Equisetum arvense, Linn. 

 Field-horsetail (Polishing-haulm), in sandy and clayey fields. 

 Flowers March and April, collected at or near Gorlitz, by B. 

 (Bsenitz). No. 49, Struthiopteris germanica, with a ticket simi- 

 lar to that of no, 1 — or, the name of the species, the authority, the 

 common name (German), the soil in which it grows, its census, 

 time of flowering, the locality and collector. 



The specimens are all extremely well dried, spread out, and 

 strapped down. The paper is white, of about foolscap size (?), and 

 the whole 49 are enclosed in a neat enough portfolio. About fifty 

 fine specimens of plants, named, localized, etc., with printed tickets 

 aflixed, on as many half-sheets of writing paper, and a portfolio, 

 is what may be called a bargain at a crown : 



" Wondrous cheap, 

 And for the money quite a heap, 

 Wliich any one would buy, with cash and sense." 



Speaking seriously, we have never seen so cheap a lot ; not 

 even at Messrs. Stevens's, where large bundles of plants are sold 

 for 105., or even sometimes as low as a half-a-crown. But con- 

 sider, bone lector ! that usually several duplicates are found in 

 these lots, and none of the examples are mounted, and they are not 

 seldom without names and destitute of any clue to their history. 



We earnestly wish and have good hopes that, for the credit of 

 the scientific world as well as for the promotion of botanical 

 science, and for the help of tyros, young pharmaceutists, who 

 should know what they buy of the itinerant herb collectors, suc- 

 cess may attend this publication. 



It was once thought that the addition of English names would 

 be an improvement. A Frenchman would say, so would the French 

 names. The scientific name is enough for all practical purposes ; 

 and this is truly the most practical and useful work on plants 

 that has ever appeared. 



The beautiful works of Reicheubach and Sowerby are not de- 

 preciated by comparison with these published examples of species 

 by Lasch and Bsenitz. Comparisons are odious or hateful only 

 when one person or object is exalted at the expense of another. 



