Ui9 



in chapter seven (pp. 672-704) of the results of the extensive 

 explorations, in nearly every West Indian island, by various 

 members of the staff of the New York Botanical Garden. 



So much for a very meager record of the most important 

 phytogeographical work that has appeared in this country. If 

 the review seems to be little more than a catalog of errors and 

 omissions, it must be stated that only the more important errors 

 of fact have claimed attention, and that scores of minor in- 

 accuracies have been glossed over owing to lack of space. 



In the recently issued first part of a history of botany by E. L. 

 Greene, we have become familiar with a style of writing that has 

 set a high literary ideal for all future botanical works in this 

 country. The warmest admirer of the present book can never, 

 unfortunately, claim for it consideration as a piece of literature. 

 Note for example the following quotation, exactly copied as to 

 punctuation and wording. "For facility in treatment and also 

 for the purpose of classification the following broad arrangement 

 will be followed in presenting the historic facts which concern 

 this chapter with the following broad classification of material 

 according to geography:" . . . . (p. i). Besides the two pages 

 of corrections published in the beginning of the work, the re- 

 viewer has found at least as many more typographical errors 

 that escaped the reader of the proofs. It is perhaps almost 

 impossible to guard against such things in a book written here 

 and printed and edited in Germany. 



The eighteen plates are notable contributions to the illustration 

 of North American plants and their habitats, but of the thirty- 

 two text figures, thirteen are from Die Natilrlichen Pflanzen- 

 familien or Das Pflanzenreich, and lack altogether phytogeo- 

 graphical or ecological significance. The rest are from photo- 

 graphs and much more valuable. 



A very complete index of plants (pp. 704-790 is most useful, 

 but a similarly complete index of localities, formations, associa- 

 tions, etc., and of persons would have been of the greatest utility. 



In conclusion, the book may be said to be of far-reaching 

 usefulness in that it attempts what no other work has heretofore 

 attempted. That it will fill a long felt want is a foregone con- 

 clusion. Norman Taylor 



