91 



NOTICES OF BOOKS. 



rhe Botanical Recoul Club : Phanerogamic and Cryptogamic. Eeport 



for the years 1884, 1885, 1886, by the Editor, F. Arnold 

 Lees, M.R.C.S. Manchester : Printed by James Collins & Co., 

 King Street, 1887. 8vo, pp. 81-156, 77, 78. 



This latest addition to the Reports of the Record Club in no 

 way differs in general plan from its predecessors, which have been 

 duly noticed in these pages ; and it is open to the same objections 

 which, as it seems to us, have characterised former issues. It must 

 always be borne in mind that these Reports are not in the market, 

 and their circulation is confined to the members of the Club, and 

 to the privileged "public Institutions and Journals to which the 

 'Reports 1 a.re sent — 21 in number: so that the new names pub- 

 lished therein are inaccessible to the botanical world at large. 



The plan of including as " new county records 1 ' all such as are 

 "additional to 'Topographical Botany,' ed. 2, and to previous 

 Reports of the Botanical Record Club," involves the repetition of 



own columns and elsewhere. 



This would be the case even if this non-natural use of the phrase 

 "new county record" were adhered to by those who employ it: 

 but this is not so. Ononis ant i quorum, for example, is duly 

 entered for Beds in ■ Top. Bot.'— on old authority, it is true, but 

 Abbot's testimony has hitherto been considered worthy of credence. 

 Now it is entered as a "new county record," with the remark, 

 " No record since that in Abbot's Flora: 1 This may be a desirable 

 confirmation, but a "new county record" it certainly is not. 

 Vicia lutea, from the railway near Bedford, although marked as a 



9 , „ Wat 



have sanctioned its insertion : the same objection might be raised 

 to the inclusion of Anthoxanthum Puclii. 



Another point which strikes us as of doubtful benefit is the 

 portentous list of Eoses and llubi which swells the Report— more 

 than three pages of " new county records " alone being allowed to 

 each, plus three of Eoses and four of Eubi in the " new locality list." 

 Is it disrespectful to express a doubt as to whether the collectors 

 of tbese prickly subjects mean the same thing by the names attached 

 to them ? Is it not rather certain that they do not by any means 

 Recognise the same limit of species in these genera ? It is true that 

 Mr. Baker is given as the authority for the Eoses, but we find no 

 indication that the specimens of the " new county records " have 

 PJ ed through his hands ; while the note on one specimen that 

 the name was *' certified by Mr. J. G. Baker" seems rather to imply 

 hat for the others he is not to be held responsible. He has, how- 

 ler, furnished many notes in the " new locality list." As to the 

 ««bi— -well, on most of them Prof. Babington has given an opinion, 

 a nd no better can be obtained. For the novelties under these 

 genera, however, Mr. Lees himself is responsible. These are Buhu 

 B ?teri and Rosa tommtosa var. uncinate— the former " == the H. 

 nitidus var. hamulosus P. J . Mull, of L. C. 8th " ; the latter is a new 

 twin found near T.lfl.ntairW.lmn bv Mr. Charles Bailey. 



