454 



NATURE 



[Sept. 27. 1877 



into details, of the distinct types of organisation existing in 

 the vegetable kingdom. Such a book should, as far as 

 possible, draw its illustrations from plants which the 

 teacher could without any very great difficulty place 

 before his pupils. After intelligently comparing the 

 descriptions with as many of the structures described as 

 opportunity afforded, a student should have a tolerably 

 clear idea of the leading facts in the comparative vege- 

 table physiology and morphology of plants. Sachs's 

 " Text-book " is a perfect mine of information of the most 

 accurate and recent kind on all manner of special points, 

 but it is rather a book for the advanced student to 

 consult than for the beginner to study. It is often 

 difficult in it " to see the wood for the trees," to keep 

 well in view the firm grasp of fundamental principles of 

 organisation which the distinguished author undoubtedly 

 possesses, but which the richness of the materials that 

 he has on the whole so ably marshalled cannot, espe- 

 cially on a first reading, but very considerably obscure. 

 Huxley and Martin's " Elementary Biology " is un- 

 doubtedly very useful for first breaking ground, but the 

 vegetable types are of course treated in relation to 

 the animal and with the view of bringing out certain 

 general laws applicable to the whole of organised nature. 

 The commencing botanist of course wants something 

 more specialised than this, and for a long time past there 

 has been perhaps little better in English than the able 

 and philosophical sketch of the vegetable kingdom which 

 is contained in the opening chapter of Dr. Carpenter's 

 " Comparative Physiology." 



At first sight it seemed as if the desideratum had been 

 supplied by Thomd's " Lehrbuch der Botanik," of which 

 an English translation has recently been published by 

 Mr. A. W. Bennett. An examination of its pages is, 

 however, disappointing. There is an entire want on the 

 part of the author of any definite grasp of his subject, and 

 this, combined with a good deal of vagueness and inac- 

 curacy in the facts, preclude the book being regarded as 

 possessing any higher value than a mere compihtion 

 which is only not vtry bad because recourse has been 

 had to fairly good sources of information. All through 

 there are evidences that the author has not a prac- 

 tical familiarity with the subject on which he is writing. 

 A few instances will suffice to illustrate this defect. 

 On p. 10 we are told " Protoplasm . . . which is 

 inclosed in a cell-wall has ... no power of escaping 

 from its envelope ;" but the author confutes himself on p. 

 284 by stating a propasoi Myxomycetes : " The germinat- 

 ing spore, now provided with a cell wall, allows the 

 whole of its protoplasmic contents to escape." On p. 24 

 there is the extraordinary statement that in some MuscitiecE 

 starch-grains " are points of crystallisation around which 

 the mass of chlorophyll has been deposited." And a little 

 further on, speaking of the chlorophyll corpuscles of 

 Metzgeria, we are told " They multiply also by division, 

 splitting up into two new bodies, each capable of inde- 

 pendent life ; " yet chlorophyll-corpuscles are incapable 

 of life mdependent of the cell of which they are specialised 

 constituents. On p. 29 it is stated that the " purpose of 

 the formation of starch is that it may be stored up in 

 the cells as a reserve food material," which is about as 

 just a view of this important process of nutrition as if 

 we were to say of wheat that the purpose of its cultiva- 



tion was to fill granaries. After this we may pass over 

 as comparatively unimportant, the queer statement that 

 starch is " deposited in especially large quantities in . . 

 pollen-grains " of all things in the world. 



On p. 32 we are told that cell-division commences by 

 " the protoplasm . . . contracting into a spherical form." 

 The figure on the opposite page tacitly corrects this error. 



On p. 44 we learn that '■'■Periderm consists of tabular cells 

 with thicker walls, which, when looked at vertically, have 

 a regular polygonal or stellate appearance." This is far 

 from clear, and certainly not universally true. On p. 52 

 we are informed : — 



" The laticiferous vessels and the true vessels together 

 have been compared to the venous and arterial blood- 

 vessels of animals ; but since a direct connection between 

 them has not been proved, and the mature vessels are 

 normally filled with air, this comparison cannot be 

 maintained." 



In an educational book surely we may ask that the 

 debris of effete hypothesis should be left to slumber in its 

 appropriate oblivion. Any one who has ever examined 

 students will shudder to think how often this quaint 

 relic of the phytotomy of two centuries ago will be trotted 

 out triumphantly when far more important things are 

 altogether forgotten. 



Passing over the histology — the treatment of which 

 cannot be regarded as satisfactory — we find a section 

 on " The external form of plants " which, under this 

 apparently philosophical heading, siinply conceals the 

 old dreary sterility of the descriptive terminology .of 

 flowering plants. Even this is wanting in accuracy. Thus, to 

 take a single page (79) : "scandent" is given as asynonym 

 of twining, the fact being that it includes every form of 

 climbing except twining ; again, Solomon's seal is said to 

 develop its llowering stems from terminal buds, while it 

 is obvious that they are axillary, and therefore lateral. 



The " Special Morphology" is far better planned, and if 

 thoroughly revised and published separately, might make 

 — as it is well-illustrated, though chiefly with borrowed 

 woodcuts — a handy little text-book. There is the same 

 want of severe accuracy, however, to the confusion o 

 students. Thus (p. 192), the suspensor in phanerogams 

 is termed the pro-embryo ; p. 315, the same term is 

 applied to the prothallus of ferns ; the structures, of course, 

 are morphologically in no way homologous. Merely to 

 mention defects as they catch the eye in turning over the 

 pages, on p. 274, ascospores are said to be contained in 

 perithecia, oblivious of the asci ; p. 275, saprophytic fungi 

 are mentioned when saprogenous are intended ; p. 296, 

 HepaticeB are said to form " a beautiful transition from 

 the Thallogens to the Acrogens," which only shows 

 how easily persons may be deluded by mere "adaptive" 

 characters ; on p. 309 the author confuses — which is 

 almost incredible — the vascular bundle-sheath with the 

 sclerenchyma in the fern- stem ; p. 337, the North 

 American Callitris is mentioned, North African being 

 intended, and the two-lobed anthers of Taxinea: are 

 mentioned, when Taxiis, for example, has usually a six- 

 lobed anther, as he tells us on p. 336. 



We have not examined very critically the concluding 

 chapters on Fossil and Geographical Botany, but the 

 latter, at any rate, seems too vague to be very useful. 



Altogether, we cannot but feel sorry that Mr. Bennett 



