Ik Qidncy on Imitation in the Fine Arts. 597 



iS'e^ Botanist's Guide, now completed, has, doubtless, been to 

 the author a work of immense labour, and very considerable 

 expense ; but he appears to be enthusiastically devoted to the 

 subject, and, as the following notice will show, is generous and 

 liberal to a degi'ee rarely to be met with. 



" Notice. — The above works [Remarks on the Geographical Distribution of 

 British Plants, the New Botanist'' s Guide, and Statistics of Phrenology] are calcu- 

 lated to be useful to persons devoting attention to the departments of science 

 to which they relate ; but, being works not at all of general interest, they will 

 seldom be found in pubHc libraries, and thus cannot be consulted by persons 

 not in possession of copies. The consideration of this circumstance induces 

 the author to express his willingness to present copies to any individuals really 

 interested in the subjects to which the works relate, but who may not find it 

 convenient to purchase them from the booksellers. His only stipulation is, 

 that any one desirous of procuring copies in this way shall be known to him- 

 self, or to some of the correspondents mentioned as having supplied inform- 

 ation to the author, connected with the contents of the works." 



The New Botanisfs Guide, whether to the gardener or the 

 amateur, will be of great value in three different ways : as a 

 substitute for local floras, which, being works of very limited 

 sale, are generally very expensive ; as indicating the plants worth 

 looking for in any given locality ; and as affording an assistance, 

 to a certain extent, in even determining the names of indigenous 

 plants. 



In the preface to this work are some general observations on 

 the ultimate tendency of botany, which we shall, perhaps, quote 

 on some future occasion ; contenting ourselves at present with 

 the following sentence : — 



" Experiments and accidental observations, with some aid from chemistry 

 and mechanical inventions, have enabled practical farmers greatly to augment 

 and improve the vegetable produce of Britain : but it is hardly sayino- too 

 much, to suggest that a scientific knowledge of the laws of vegetation, though 

 it will be slowly acquired, must place a future race of cultivators as much 

 above the present workmen, in skill and power, as the scientific chemist of 

 to-day is superior to the cooks and the drug venders, who were the chemists, 

 empirically, centuries ago." 



Art. IV. An Essay on the Nature, the End, and the Means of 

 Imitation in the Fine Arts. Translated from the French of 

 M. Quatreraere de Quincy, by J. C Kent, Esq. 8vo. London, 



1837. 



We feel that we have been guilty of a certain degree of in- 

 justice to Mr. Kent in not having sooner noticed this work in 

 this Magazine. We have not, however, been unmindful of it 

 in the Arch. Mag. ; and we are happy to state that it has been 

 flivourably received by the literary world in general. The title- 

 page does not seem to indicate a work that will be at all useful 

 to gardeners ; nevertheless, it contains the rudiments of the only 

 satisfactory theory of gardening, as an art of imagination, that 



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