BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, ETC. 119 
r. George Massee, F.L.S., followed with a lantern demonstra- 
tion of his researches on the Evolution of Parasitism in Fu ungi. To 
understand clearly the evolution of parasitism it is important to 
grasp a fundamental point in the evolution of fungi genesis The 
most primitive forms were aquatic, and reproduced by zoospores 
which necessitated the presence of water to secure their dispersion. 
As the fungi gradually took possession of dry land, a secon nd 
wind, &c., was gradually evolved. s supplementary conidial 
condition is always the form that has acenthed a parasitic condition, 
the ep sexual phase Sars me ophyte and developing 
smuts, Ustilago avene, &c., where the host 1s attacked as a 
seedling, and is stimulate d to an unusual condition of growth 
- throughout its normal Lee: of growth. More advanced parasites 
show a tendency to arrest the production of spores and conidia, 
and to perpetuate Fritint ss by perennial mycelium located in 
3, &e. 
in the seed. In the most highly evolved parasites reproductive 
bodies are entirely ibeg eg and the parasite is perpetuated by 
hybernating mycelium only. 
Tue §.P.C.K. has brought out a new issue—the “ thirty- 
second edition "—of Flowers of the Field (7s. 6d.)—a reprint of 
the revised edition by Mr. Boulger, with the addition of sixty-four 
coloured plates, mostly selected from those in Mr, Henslow’s Brit- 
ish Wild Flowers, which was noticed in our last issue. The effect 
is not altogether good, as many of the plants were already figured 
in the book, and it looks rather absurd to have two pictures each 
of Clematis, Columbine, Evening Primrose, é&c., facing one another. 
nishes one more instance ety e unwisdom of pro- 
ducing such a work be a submitting it te a botanist, Pistia 
even an ordinary observer might notice that the two plants fi 
and named as Geranvem pia cannot be identical—the coloured 
p Ww 
and “ Calamintha officinalis” is Salvia verticillata; the lettering 
of the two plates labelled respectively ‘‘ Colchicum peg ” an 
Crocus sativus” has evidently been transposed: t ~egneeae Mir 
figures of each correct, but the merest tyro pti at a glance 
that diag e same care- 
lessness or ignoran ce is found in the list bt ce coloured plates, where 
we have Sh earthen sagetum, Antirrhinum Orontwm, ; Rubus ? 
oe Papaver Rheas; Scabiosa sear ek not “face 
