BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, ETC. 63 
writers in question. 
Sir Rawson Wittiam Rawson, who died at South Kensington on 
the 20th of last November, was born in London on Sept. 8, 181 
His life was spent in the Colonial Service, in which he held positions 
of distinction in Mauritius, at the Cape, and in the Bahamas, ending 
his official career as Governor of the Windward Islands, from which 
f K.C.M.G 
he retired in 1875, when he received the title of K.C. 
will be found in the Phytologist for 1852 (iv. 696), where three 
Cheshire ferns are recorded by him. He collected in the various 
countries in which he was stationed, and in 1858, in conjunction 
with Dr. Pappe, published at Cape Town a Synopsis Filicum Africa 
Australis. In this several new species are described, many of which 
were subsequently reduced by Buchanan (Ferns of Natal, 1875), who 
had access to Mr. Rawson’s specimens. Besides those of his own 
gathering, Sir Rawson’s herbarium contained a large number of 
specimens from various collectors; unfortunately, the collection had 
suffered much damage before it was acquired by the British Museum, 
but it contains specimens of interest in connection with species 
published by him. 
At the meeting of the Linnean Society on Jan. 18th, Mr. George 
igher form, were examined, with result that the conidial 
condition of Spherostilbe mic) ospora and S. gracilipes proved to be 
identical in structure with Stilbum vulgare, In O words, true 
Tue London Quarterly Review for October last contained an 
interesting article on “ The Primrose and Darwinism” by a writer 
who styles himself A Field Naturalist, M.A. Camb.” The con- 
clusion arrived at, after a careful survey of the literature of the 
subject, is ‘that the primrose gives strong confirmatory evidence 
to Axell’s view, that under natural and equal conditions self- 
