NOTICES OF BOOKS. 59 
to ss botanists, and which we have from year to year trans- 
to our columns. On this occasion we find little which we can 
ssiohed ly ee, shou the notes on the specimens distributed 
will be to those who possess the plants to which they 
refer’ Mr. Varenne sends examples of Brassica Briggsii from 
Penzance (see Journ. Bot., 1881, p. 360); Dr. neta _— that 
Rubus eee recorded by Mr. Melvill as occ n Kent 
(Journ. Bot., 1881, p. 251), is ‘‘ naturalised in ane ne ces 
Arran” : the ‘hybrid __ (Carduus palustris x heterophyllus), which 
My. Jenner called C. Carolorum, has been cultivated at Balmuto, a 
reports Daphne Mezereum “ amongs hes on a steep, hill- 
side, apparently truly wild, near Alstonfield, Stafford.” Of an 
Alopecurus sent inton from ‘“ Bottesford to Belvoir 
astle, Leicester, Mr. Lees says ‘‘ 1 have examined it carefully, and 
wn, and 
creeping runners, I call it nigricans, Hornem.” Mr. Leefe says of 
a Willow sent by ae reese from Tattenhall, Wolverhampton, ‘1 — 
aaas your plant to be Salix holosericea Willd. ., not Hook. I 
never saw a Baitish we before’; and Dr. Boswell confirms 
this identification. We are sorry to see that Mr. Lees adds a new 
synonym to the interesting sedge —— and described by Mr. 
idles Vourn, Bot. 1881, p. 97, tab. 2 ee as Carex pilulifera, var. 
esit. r. Lees now calls this sient ** C. pilulifera, var. saxumbra 
: eee (1880), This is erroneous ; Mr. Lees published the plant, 
not as a variety, but as a species, ‘with the specific name Saxumbra. 
If retained as a species, that name must of course stand, although 
Mr. Lees himself has since quoted it has ‘ C. Leest sii Ridley ” (see 
Journ. Bot. 1882, p. 98); but if the ant 3 is a variety of pilulifera, 
there is no coals of setting Mr. Ridley’s name aside. Dr. 
Boswell notes upon the specimens sent (from the original —s 
at ote to the Club—* Certainly a most remarkable for 
the glumes are so totally unlike those of ordinary pilulifera. "it 
ae aes the plants should be cultivated to see if it be not 
The Colours of Flowers as illustrated in the British Flora. By Grant 
Auten. London: Macmillan. 1882. 
Tus is a very readable ttle volume, ba contents = Poko 
have already appeared in ‘ Nature,’ and are now reprin an t 
‘Nature Series.’ The opening chapter is asvcbel to the statenlant 
of a theory that petals are derived from flattened and abortive 
len 
stamens. Mr. Allen puts this view Solo us with much immaie 
ut we 46 not think botanists will be convinced that the generally 
accepted theory has been disproved. The bulk of the little sebbatne 
is occupied with a very interesting analysis of the colours of o 
British flowering plan Allen considers ‘all ers 
were in their earliest form yellow; then some of them became 
white ; at, a few of them grew to be re 
