RECENT PROGRESS OF SYSTEMATIC BOTANY, 37 
More recently the botanical papers in the Copenhagen Transactions and 
Journals are frequently accompanied by a French abstract; and in Sweden 
some of their Natural-History memoirs, such as Morell’s ‘ Monograph of 
Spiders,’ have been printed exclusively in English. German is also a lan- 
guage very generally understood by Swedish men of science, more so amongst 
some of them than French or English; and it cannot be too strongly recom- 
mended to them to bear in mind that, at the present day, the study of 
Swedish and Danish is not usually treated as more necessary to the general 
botanist than that of Dutch. 
Still less is it the case with the Russian language, which, notwithstanding 
its poetic beauty, its conciseness, and many other intrinsic advantages, 
besides the extent of territory over which it is officially spoken, is far too 
uncongenial with those of Western Europe to give any prospect of its being 
generally learnt, and the publication in it of any works intended for foreign 
circnlation cannot be too strongly deprecated. The Academy of Sciences of 
St. Petersburgh and the principal Natural-History Society of Moscow accord- 
ingly admit in their Transactions and Bulletins memoirs in French, German, 
or Latin ; but still there are a few important ones issued by these bodies as 
well as by a second Moscow Society, and others at Kazan and Odessa, entirely 
in Russian. These are of course ignored by the rest of the botanical world 
until translated or abstracted in one of the western languages. Such is also 
the fate of the fortunately very few botanical papers which I have met with 
in Polish, Bohemian, and Hungarian publications. 
The Portuguese and Spaniards, with the vast possessions they formerly 
held in America, where their languages have persisted as national, and those 
they still retain (the former in tropical Africa, the latter in the Philippines 
and West Indies), have in their time done good work in botany, and have 
generally had the good sense to publish in Latin. There are some floras, 
however, of their present or former colonies, more used by foreigners than 
by themselves, which are entirely in their own languages. But these 
languages, are, I believe, not now spreading further, and in America, at least, 
English is gaining upon them for business transactions. For the Portuguese 
language I have little sympathy, for it has always appeared to me harsh and 
disagreeable ; but one cannot but feel some regret that so noble and powerful 
a language as the Spanish should now be applied to so little purpose. 
Italian botanical publications are rather numerous and of some importance, 
especially in physiological and theoretical botany (their floras are mostly in 
Latin); the language is also so generally and deservedly admired in a literary 
point of view, and so far from difficult to those who are acquainted with 
Latin and French, that some knowledge of it might be recommended to 
botanists. Yet such general acquaintance with it ought not to be too much 
relied upon; and Italian botanists will do well in continuing to resort to 
Latin or French for such works as are intended for the use of foreigners. 
And, lastly, with regard to modern Greek, we can only hope that its use will 
be closely restricted to purposes of local instruction, which is indeed the 
character of the few botanical publications I have seen in that language. 
We may now proceed to consider the principal works in systematic botany 
recently published or now in progress, under the several heads above 
enumerated. 
1, OrpINEs Pranrarvm, or General Expositions of the Orders and Sub- 
orders constituting the Vegetable Kingdom. 
It is to these ‘Ordines Plantarum’ that we are now obliged to limit our 
