1915] CURRENT LITERATURE 247 
P. graminis. Sowings of teleutospores of Puccinia Phragmitis (Schum.) 
Korn. showed that Rumex aquaticus L., R. confertus Willd., R. maritimus L., 
tfoli n 
spores from R. Frangula L., the aecidial host for P. coronata.—H. HASSELBRING. 
Origin of herbaceous angiosperms.—The question of the relative antiquity 
hb 
statements of the view are rare, that herbaceous plants preceded the woody, and 
such a view was likely to be held as long as the monocotyledons were believed 
to be the older angiosperms. The authors deal with evidence from four 
sources: paleobotany, anatomy, phylogeny, and phytogeography, and reach 
a conclusion entirely at variance with the prevailing theory. Under the 
first head it is pointed out that the ancient club mosses and _horsetails 
were arborescent, but it is admitted that the evidence is not conclusive. 
The anatomical evidence hinges on the question whether the primary wood was 
originally a continuous layer or a series of bundles. Examination of various 
groups of plants leads to the inference that the cambium was originally a com- 
plete ring, and that its segregation into “fascicular” and “‘interfascicular”’ 
cambium is a relatively recent occurrence. In explaining how this may have 
come about, JEFFREY attaches importance to the leaf traces, but from this 
view our authors dissent; they attribute the production of discrete bundles to 
a simple decrease in activity of the cambium. In connection with phylogeny, 
a survey of the families of angiosperms shows that the primitive types are 
much more woody than the recent ones. In more than half of the families of 
dicotyledons there are no herbaceous species, and exclusively herbaceous 
families consist of insectivores, parasites, or other recent forms. Under the 
heading of phytogeography a large array of facts is gathered, leading to the 
conclusion that angiosperms made their appearance in the tropics as woody 
plants, and spread into the north temperate zone, where gradual stunting 
occurred, largely as a consequence of lowered temperature, resulting finally in 
the production of annuals. Such herbaceous plants have subsequently 
spread to all aoe of the earth’s surface. Insular and other endemic flora 
5 Sinnott, E. W., and Bartey, I. W., Investigations on the phylogeny of the 
angiosperms 4. The origin and dispersal sf herbaceous angiosperms. Ann. Botan 
28:547-600. pls. 39, 40. 1914. 
