364 BOTANICAL GAZETTE | NOVEMBER 
evidence that nothing is intended beyond a current field manual for work of 
the most general character.—JOHN GAYLORD COULTER. 
Dr. CarL HOLTERMANN ” has just published, with the assistance of the 
Royal Prussian Academy of Science in Berlin, an elaborate account of his 
mycological studies in Java and Ceylon. The morphology and in many 
cases life-histories of some forty forms, chiefly Basidiomycetes, are described 
and illustrated with a dozen fine plates. Two new genera, Oscarbrefeldia 
and Conidiascus, and one new species, Ascoidea saprolegniotdes, are added to 
the Hemiasci. The author is not willing to follow strictly Brefeld’s views in 
respect to the derivation of the conidium from the sporangium. His studies 
upon the tropical forms indicate that the two structures may be phylogenet- 
ically quite independent of one another. He believes that each has its own 
Antage, and that the direct influence of external conditions determines the 
development of one or the other or both upon the same mycelium.— BRADLEY 
OoRE Davis. 
Parts 175 and 176 of Engler and Prantl’s Dée natirlichen Pflanzen- 
familien contain the completion of the Umbelliferee by Drude, and the Cor- 
nacee by Harms. This completes the Archichlamydez, a cause for con- 
gratulation among taxonomists. The parts of this great work have been 
noticed briefly from time to time, as they appeared, and the general purpose 
and its execution warmly commended. It is certainly an epochal work, and 
supplies a much needed compact and illustrated presentation of known gen- 
era. The breadth of the plan has not been approached by any other “ Gen- 
era Plantarum.” The necessity of bringing together the work of so many 
collaborators has made the editorial work onerous, and of course there is 
great unevenness of presentation. It is impossible to criticise such a work 
in general. The students of different groups must pass judgment upon the 
work in their particular fields.— J. M. C. 
NOTES FOR STUDENTS. 
BY GROWING plants of Indian corn from sterilized seeds in sterile nutrient 
fluid, to which he had added glucose, Laurent has determined that their roots 
are capable of absorbing organic matter in this form.%-—C. R. B. 
Mr. Davip WuiTe“ has described and figured a new lepido 
genus, Omphalophioios, from the Lower Coal Measures of Missouri, 
upon the problematic Lefidodendron cyclostigma of Lesquereux. —]. 
dendroid 
founded 
2G 
 HOLTERMANN, CARL: pepe mtas Untersuchungen aus den Tropem- “ 
pp. viii++-122. f/. 72, Berlin: Gebriider Borntraeger. 1898. 47. 25. 
7. 1897. 
™ Bull. Geol. Soc. Amer. g: 329-342. pls. 20-23. 1898. 
