CURRENT LITERATURE. 
A guide to wild flowers. 
That there is a deep popular interest in the flowers of the field must 
have impressed itself upon any person who was so fortunate as to be 
a part of the very large audience that saw the projections of the col- 
ored lantern slides of Mr. and Mrs. Van Brunt in Springfield during 
when a favorite flower came upon the screen, made it manifest that it 
was not the beauty of the representations alone that attracted the audi- 
ence, but an intelligent interest in the different species of plants. The 
Success of Mrs. Dana’s guide’ to the wild flowers, which has now 
la its twenty-seventh thousand, is another evidence of the same 
t 
The work has been enlarged and improved in the present edition, 
but not changed in character from the earlier edition, which was no- 
ticed in these pages.2. The volume will be of assistance to many per- 
sons who would not take the trouble to look up the names of plants 
The illustrations are an attractive feature of the volume. ey have 
4 certain artistic merit, but possess little of the characteristic pose and 
texture of the individual plants, and are not likely to be of great aid 
to the novice in locating a plant in han 
In short it seems to us that the volutes is a very poor one with 
which to study the flora of a region, but a very good one to have at 
and for occasional assistance and information. For the niche in 
which it belongs the book is an admirable one, and most welcome, 
but it is not to be expected that it will serve the purpose of a strict 
manual. The author intimates that it was written to meet the demand 
of those who wish to name flowers “without the trouble of analyzing 
them.” Bearing this limitation in mind, we have little else but praise 
nid the work. The volume is well written and attractively printed and 
u 
whe asain, SEG ate es 
* Dana, Mrs. WiLtiam Starr: How to know the wild flowers; a guide to nw 
Pema “haunts, aud reset Mee our common w dp wers. Illustrated by Mar 
Satter Revised and enlarged —, I2zmo. pp. xvii + 373. pl. 156. New 
York: ae Scribner's Seon 1895. $1.75 
218: 319. 1893. 
