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BOTANICAL BIBLIOGKAPHY. 

 By W. P. Hiern, M.A., F.L.S. 



The benefit conferred upon botanical science by the publication 

 of the two editions of the < Thesaurus literature botanical of Pritzel 

 strengthens the appetite for further information of the same kind. 

 It may be too much to expect, but it is by no means too much to 

 desire, that in addition to what can be obtained from the title-page 

 and the numbers of pages and of plates (if any) of a book, certain 

 explanatory or corrective particulars should, where necessary, have 

 been supplied in the 'Thesaurus.' It is true that occasionally 

 such particulars have been added, but there is a craving for more. 

 When a book has been issued in parts, the dates and quantities of 

 the parts should, if possible, be given ; and when two or more 

 authors divide between or amongst them portions of a book, it 

 would be useful to indicate what portions are authoritatively due 

 to each, especially in those cases where there occurs an incidental 

 author whose name does not appear on the title-page. Consider, 

 for example, the 'Flora} Senegambiae tentamen' of Guillemin, 

 Perrottet, and A. Eichard, volume i., a work of which the date on 

 the title-page gives the range of years 1830—1833. This is the only 

 volume of the book ever published, and all the authors have been 

 dead for several years ; the details of authorship for all the natural 

 orders comprised therein, except one, are indicated by names given 

 at the end of each order ; of the forty-five orders, thirty-five and 

 part of another are due conjointly to Perrottet and Guillemin, the 

 arrangement of these names being sometimes reversed ; eight and 

 a part are due to A. Eichard ; and one order is without signature. 

 From internal evidence it appears that the work was issued in 

 parts, but the sizes of the parts and the several dates of their 

 publication cannot be ascertained from the book itself. "Why 

 cannot these particulars be obtained from other sources, and given 

 for the information of botanists ? 



In like manner, the three published volumes of the ' Flora 

 Capensis ' of Harvey and Sonder are severally dated on the title- 

 Pages 1859-18G0, 18G1-1862, 1864-1865 : the separate authorship 

 of each natural order is plainly stated at the head of each order. 

 The preface at the commencement of each volume is dated in the 

 later year of the two included on the title-page; so far as I can learn 

 °n enquiry in Dublin (the place of publication), the volumes were 

 ttot published in parts : thus the ranges of years given on the title- 

 Pages appear to be delusive ; it may perhaps turn out that the 

 volumes were passing through the press in the course of those 

 years. It wou ld be important to remove doubts of this kind and to 

 place on record a clear statement of fact about them. Another 

 class of inaccuracies or omissions ought to be exposed or supplied, 

 plating to the false dates printed upon the parts of the journals or 

 transactions of learned societies, or to the absence of any precise 

 «ates. Not unfrequently the date on a part is given as the end of 



