NATURE 



THURSDAY, JULY 25 



1907. 



DILI.ENIAN MEMORIALS AT OXFORD. 

 The Dillciiian Herbaria: an Account of the Dillcnian 

 Collections in the hcrharium of the Vnivcrsitv of 

 Oxford, together with a Biographical .Sketch of 

 Dillenius. Selections from his Correspondence. 

 Notes, d^T. By G. Clandtre Druce. Edited, with 

 an introduction, by Prof. S. H. \'ines, F.R..S. 

 Pp. cxii + 258. (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 

 iqo7.) Price 12s. 6d. net. 

 T^HT.S volume is a valuable contribution to the 

 J- history of the botanic preeminence of Oxford 

 in the first half of the eis-hteenth century. It is signi- 

 ficant that the three men Carl Linnffius visited in 17 !6 

 were Sir Hans Sloane, Philip Miller, and Dillenius. 

 His credentials to the first were a commendatory 

 letter from Boerhaave ; but Sloane was then seven tv- 

 six, he had seen the rise and fall of many botanic 

 arransfements, was a follower of our own John Ray, 

 whose svsiein he had adopted when indexing- his 

 large collections of plants, and was averse to further 

 change. To him the young Swede of twentv-nine, 

 with a brand new scheme of his own, was a visionary 

 to be dismissed with speed, and therefore, with a few 

 cold compliments, Linna?us departed. ^Vith Philip 

 Miller, the gardener to the Company of .\pothecaries 

 at Chelsea, he became acquainted, bringing with him 

 letters from his patron Clifford, and a mutual ap- 

 preciation was the result. The residence of Dillenius 

 at Oxford was the chief attraction which drew 

 Linnffius to that place; there he stayed a month, and 

 might have shared the liberal offer of Dillenius to 

 divide the emoluments of the professorship between 

 them had he .so wished. 



.\t this time Dillenius had been only two years 

 installed as .Sherardian professor, though he had re- 

 ceived the stipend from the death of \Yilliam Sherard. 

 His tenure of the chair from 1734 to his death in 

 1747 was a bright interlude between two uneventful 

 periods. 



Mr. Druce has drawn up this account of the collec- 

 tions left by Dillenius, and has critically examined 

 the specimens preserved as vouchers, illuminating 

 many doubtful passages in the third edition of Ray's 

 " Synopsis," and practically disposing of the dubious 

 entries which have troubled many subsequent 

 botanists. For studies of this character the facilities 

 offered at the Botanic Garden. O.xford, are extremely 

 good, and only to be excelled by the Sloane volumes 

 in the department of botany, Cromwell Road. Mr. 

 Druce has performed a labour of love in bestowing 

 the work of years on these collections, and should be 

 encouraged to persevere until all the more important of 

 the pre-Linnean herbaria at Oxford are enumerated in 

 similar detail. It should not be forgotten that the 

 types of Sibthorp's splendid " Flora Grseca " are also 

 preserved at Oxford. 



■ The introduction by Prof. Mnes is an appreci.itive 

 essay on the position of Dillenius as regards his con- 

 temporaries; then, with a single page of preface, Mr. 

 Druce gives a life of Dillenius and bibliography, a 

 KO. 1969, VOL. 76] 



full selection from his extant correspondence (the 

 letters from Linnaeus have, unhappily, disappeared), 

 and thus, after an ample preamble, the principal 

 portion of this volume begins. 



Part v. opens with the collation of the i:)illenian 

 edition of Ray's " Synopsis " issued in 1724, with the 

 plants preserved in that special herbarium. This 

 edition was practically the chief guide of British 

 botanists for something like forty years, in fact until 

 Hudson's "Flora Anglica " superseded the Raian 

 method by the Linnean system and nomenclature. We 

 have for the first time an authoritative statement of 

 what is in the herbarium, and what stands there for 

 any given name. 



Next and in similar fashion we find an account of 

 the specimens representing the plates and descriptions 

 in the " Hortus Elthamensis," that account of the 

 garden of James Sherard the plates of which were 

 etched by Dillenius. Following this we come to the 

 great work of the author, the " Historia Muscorum," 

 with a prefixed statement of the authorities, whose 

 determinations are the basis of the modern reduc- 

 tions ; errata and index close this interesting volume. 



The temptation to dwell longer on this theme is 

 strong, but must be resisted ; the book vividly recalls 

 days spent long ago amongst these very plants and 

 manuscripts, and this notice must end with the hope 

 that another instalment from this treasure house may 

 in due time be forthcoming. B. D. J. 



THE FOURTH INTERN.iTIONAL 

 ORXITHOLOGICAL CONGRESS. 

 Proceedings of the Fourth International Ornith- 

 ological Congress, London, June, 1905, forming 

 Vol. xiv. of the " Ornis." Edited, under the direc- 

 tion of the President, Dr. R. Bowdler Sharpe, by 

 the Secretaries, Dr. Ernst J. O. Hartert and J. 

 Lewis Bonhote. Pp. 696; with 18 plates. (London : 

 Dulau and Co., 1907.) Price 21s. net. 



AS in many other branches of science, the ornith- 

 ologists have established an international con- 

 gress, and the official account of their fourth meeting, 

 held in London in June, 1905, is now before us. It 

 forms a handsome and well-illustrated volume of 696 

 pages, and constitutes also the fourteenth volume of 

 Ornis, the official journal of the association, 

 which accompanies the presidency of the congress 

 when it is moved from one country to another. 



The first meeting of the International Congress of 

 Ornithologists was held at Vienna in April, 1SS4, 

 under the presidency of Dr. Gustav Radde, of Tiflis, 

 and owes its inception, more or less, to the ill-starred 

 Crown-Prince Rudolph of .Austria, who had a certain 

 amount of interest in natural history, inspired chiefly, 

 we believe, by one of the Brehms, his personal 

 friend and companion. The meeting at Vienna 

 was a success to a certain extent, and was followed 

 seven years later by the second meeting, which took 

 place at Budapest in 1891. This congress was very 

 well attended, and was carried out with great eclat 

 by the enthusiastic naturalists of the Hungarian 

 capital. English ornithology was represented by the 



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