288 



PART II. 



REVIEWS. 



Art. I. Flora Devoniensis : or a Descriptive Catalogue of Plants 

 growing tvild in the County of Devon, arranged both according 

 to the Linnean and Natural Systems, with an Account of their 

 Geographical Distribution, S^c. By the Rev. J. P. Jones and 

 J. F. Kingston. London. 8vo. 16*. 



Local Floras are exceedingly useful both to the novice in science and 

 the professed botanist. They confine the observation of the inexperienced 

 within a limited district, and lessen the number of his particulars ; they lead 

 him to an acquaintance with certain species, by directing him to their locali- 

 ties in his neighbourhood, while the authors generally become the referees 

 to clear up such obscure points as require elucidation. To the practised 

 botanist they are still more important : they furnish him with materials for 

 determining the conditions required for particular plants, and supply him 

 also, in some measure, with the negative as well as the positive list of the 

 district. 



The authors of the present work, instead of making botany a mere study 

 of hard names, have very properly appended some general observations on 

 vegetable distribution. We are sorry they are so meagre ; and that, with 

 the views they profess to entertain, so large a portion of the volume should 

 be filled with technical matter ; as, in the present day, a local Flora ought 

 not to be confined to the hackneyed description of species which is to be 

 found in every general work, but should be distinguished by such research 

 as carries the subject forward ; and especially those particulars should be 

 noticed which are presented to advantage in a limited district. 



The county of Devon is very favourable for such an undertaking : it 

 offers to the botanist a great variety of soil j and some extensive and well 

 marked strata. It comprehends a granite district, including Dartmoor, 

 which will yield him a rich harvest of cryptogamic plants j a slate district of 

 various degrees (tf fertility; transition limestone, less luxuriant; red sand- 

 stone, uniformly fertile ; besides a long tract of coast, both on the north and 

 south, where some of the greatest rarities of the kingdom are to be found. 

 The authors observe, " With all this variety in the rock strata, we know 

 of no peculiar vegetable features by which to distinguish one formation from 

 another : the Cisteae, Conyza squarrosa, and one or two other plants, seem 

 to affect the limestone ; the Clematis, also, appears to grow more luxuriantly 

 among the crevices of that rock than elsewhere ; whilst the /'ris foetidissima 

 and the elm prevail most in the red sandstone. Still, neither these, nor any 

 other species, so far as we are aware, are exclusively confined to any parti- 

 cular formation." We entertain, ourselves, a hope that accurate observ- 

 ation will detect many vegetable attachments, few of which, probably, will 

 be found exclusive ; but the like conditions being given of moisture, tem- 

 perature, sunshine, shade, and other elements, then we may expect to find 

 plants making an election of soil or stratum, so as to obtain them in the 

 degree suited to their nature. 



We regret that the authors should have been compelled to leave to the 

 future a closer examination of the northern portion of the county, as they 

 will find it well worth a minute investigation. Their suspicions that the 



