770 TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION K. 



all species of known British plants, follow the Linnscan classification and nomen- 

 clature in so far as the authors were able to identify the Linnscan species in the 

 British flora. ' English Botany,' begun in 1795, with plates by Sowerby and 

 text by Smith, was a work of the first rank in its aim of figuring all British plants 

 and in the excellence of the plates ; but it shared the defect of certain other 

 great floras in the plates being prepared and issued as the plants could be pro- 

 cured, and thus being without order. Its cost also necessarily put it beyond the 

 reach of most botanists, except those that had the advantage of access to it in ■ 

 seme large library. A second edition, issued at a lower price, and with the plants 

 arranged on the Linna?an system, was inferior to the first, in the plates being only 

 partially coloured and in having the text much curtailed. The so-called third 

 edition of the ' English Botany,' issued 1868-86, is a new work as far as the text is 

 concerned, that being the work of Dr. Boswell Syme, who made it worthily repre- 

 sentative of its subject; but the plates, with few exceptions, are reissues of those 

 of the first edition, less perfect as impressions and far less carefully coloured; 

 and this applies with still greater force to a reissue of the third edition a few 

 years ago. This edition, moreover, included only the vascular plants and 

 Characeac. As this is the only large and fully illustrated British flora that has 

 been attempted, it is almost needless to add that in this respect provision for the 

 s'udy of the flora of our islands is far behind that of certain other countries, and 

 very notably behind that made in the 'Flora danica.' 



Turning next to the provision of less costly aids to the study of British plants, 

 we have manuals of most of the larger groups. The vascular plants are treated 

 of in numerous works, including a considerable number of illustrated books in 

 recent years, inexpensive but insufficient for any but the most elementary 

 students. Fitch's outline illustrations to Bentham's ' Handbook to the British 

 Flora,' supplemented by W. G. Smith, were issued in a separate volume in 1887, 

 which is still the best for use in the inexpensive works of this kind. Babington's 

 ' Manual,' on its first appearance in 1843, was gladly welcomed as embodying the 

 result of careful and continued researches by its author into the relations of British 

 plants to their nearest relatives on the Continent of Europe ; and each successive 

 issue up to the eighth in 1881 received the careful revision of the author, and con- 

 tained additions and modifications. In 1904 a ninth edition was edited, after the 

 author's death, by H. and J. Groves; but, though the editors included notes left 

 by Professor Babington prepared for a new edition, they were ' unable to make 

 alterations in the treatment of some of the critical genera which might perhaps 

 have been desirable.' The ' Student's Flora of the British Islands,' by Sir J. D. 

 Hooker, issued in 1870, took the place of the ^ell-known 'British Flora' (1830, 

 and in subsequent editions until the eighth in I860, the last three being issued in 

 collaboration by Sir W. J. Hooker and Professor Walker Arnott). The third 

 edition of the ' Student's Flora ' appeared in 1884, and there has been none since. 

 Mr. F. N. Williams' ' Prodromus Floras Britannicse,' begun in 1901, of which 

 lefs than one-half has yet appeared, though a work of much value and authority, 

 is scarcely calculated for the assistance of the ordinary student ; and Mr. Druce's 

 new edition of Hayward's 'Botanist's Pocket Book' 'is intended merely to 

 enable the botanist in the field to name his specimens approximately, and to 

 refresh the memory of the more advanced worker.' In all the books that are. 

 intended for the use of British botanists, apart from one or two recently issued 

 local floras, the classification is still that in use in the middle of last century, 

 even to the extent in the most of them of retaining Coniferre as a division of 

 Dicotyledones. Apart from this, the critical study of British plants has led to 

 the detection of numerous previously unobserved and unnamed forms, which find 

 no place in the ' Student's Flora,' and are only in part noticed in the recent 

 edition of the 'Manual.' 



The ' Lists ' of vascular plants of the British flora that have recently been 

 issued by Messrs. Rendle and Britten, by Mr. Druce, and as the tenth edition 

 of the ' London Catalogue of British Plants ' are all important documents for 

 the study of the British flora ; but they illustrate very forcibly certain of the 

 difficulties that beset the path of the student eager to' gain a knowledge of the 

 plants of his native land. In these lists he finds it scarcely possible to gain a 

 clear idea of how far the species and varieties of the one correspond with those 

 of the other, owing to the diversities of the names employed. It would be a great 



