or flowering plants. Most of the photographs were taken by 

 Attorney Geo. B. Parker, of Pittsburgh, an enthusiastic 

 flower photographer whose exquisitely colored lantern-slides 

 are well known around western Pennsylvania. 



Dr. Gress intentionally makes the book "as simple and free 

 from technical terms as scientific accuracy will permit" and it 

 should be interesting and useful to high-school pupils, scouts, 

 and to the general non-technical public. General directions 

 are given about collecting, pressing, mounting, and studying 

 plants; the general structure and life-cycle of the plant is simply 

 discussed, and then follow the descriptions of the various 

 species. In connection with the descriptions and pictures of 

 the plants are included accounts of insect visitors, economic 

 uses, medicinal or poisonous properties, peculiarities of growth, 

 habitat, or flower structure — in fact, just the interesting 

 things that most people want to know about, after they find 

 out what the plant is. 



O. E. Jennings 



Durand's Field Book of Common Ferns* 



No group of plants better repays study than the ferns. A 

 small group, one can become familiar with nearly all the species 

 of any region in one summer. Succeeding years will add a few 

 rare species or various new forms of familiar species. To help 

 make a hobby of ferns or just to scrape acquaintance with them, 

 there has recently appeared a new volume of Putnam's Field 

 Books. This has been made as simple as possible,^ — possibly 

 too simple for anyone who already knows something of the 

 ferns. Only nine scientific terms are used, including midvein, 

 spore-case, fruit-dot and habitat.. Sporangium and sorus might 

 have been used instead of the corresponding terms without 

 making the book too technical and certainly the indusia should 

 have been described, even if under some other name. 



Fifty species of ferns are described and illustrated. There 

 is a beautiful set of habitat pictures from photographs of the 

 ferns as they grew, often with a wild flower of some kind at 

 the side. In addition there are habitat photographs of four of 



*Field Book of Common Ferns, Herbert Durand. 219 pages. 1928. G. P. 

 Putnam's Sons. $2.50. 



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