79 
the student be expected to place into this order an apetalous fla- 
court, of which there are many: 
However, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and we 
_ trust that a study of the textbook will give a student a more gen- 
eral familiarity with plant families than we have indicated by these 
two possible exceptions, although there are many more of the 
same sort which might be enumerated. 
More than half of the book, 537 pages, to be exact, is devoted 
to a general description of the groups of angiosperms. A con- 
densed description is given of each order, followed by a list of the 
families and a key to the more important ones which an Ameri- 
can student is likely to meet. Then each family is discussed in 
turn, with a statement of its characters, the number of genera and 
species, mention of the more important genera, and often special 
mention of particular species. The amount of space assigned to 
each family is in general proportionate to its importance, meas- 
ured by its size, its representation among the economic plants of 
the world, and its development in America. This assignment is 
largely a matter of opinion and deserves no criticism : personally 
we should not have devoted half a page to the three genera Didi- 
tlis, Rotala, and Decodon and the same amount to such an im- 
portant family as the Dipterocarpaceae. 
There is no doubt that the use of such a book will be chiefly in 
the United States, and that there is good reason for discussing the 
native families in more detail than those exclusively tropical. The 
mere fact, however, that many tropical families will be known to 
the average student only through the printed description is an ex- 
cellent reason for demanding absolute accuracy of statement about 
em. Let us take for example the large and important family 
Malpighiaceae, which is very properly included in the author's 
€y to the principal families” under the order Geraniales on page 
322, There the family is keyed out as having regular flowers and 
‘arpels splitting apart at maturity ; it is spelled “Malphigiaceae , 
which scarcely does credit to the book. Now a great many plants 
of the family have irregular flowers and two of the large genera 
Byr Sonima and Bunchosia) as well as many smaller ones have 
fruits which do not separate at maturity. The matter is stated cor- 
rectly, to be sure, in the discussion of the family on page 335, but 
the key ig invalidated by such an error and the student should not 
Fequired to check the accuracy of each statement by reference 
