246 Scientific Intelligence. 



opinion of Treub, that the ants have nothing to do with the 

 formation of this organ. Be this as it may, it is most snpposable 

 that this extraordinary formation was acquired gradually ; that 

 the normally fleshy caulicle of the ancestral plant, made a nidus 

 by an insect, developed under the disturbing stimulus somewhat 

 as a gall develops, until at length the tendency became hereditary 

 and the singular adaptation of plant to insect was established. 

 In formulating such an hypothesis, which falls in so naturally 

 with prevalent conceptions, Signor Beccari, in his elaborate 

 exposition, goes back very far for his starting point, even to the 

 properties of protoplasm, the development of protista into proto- 

 phytes and protozoa, the development of the former into higher- 

 organized forms, and so on ; coming down at length to the 

 hypothesis that the various adaptations of flowers to insects, 

 (irregularities in form, the development of nectaries, the growth of 

 these into hollow spurs or sacs, etc.), have resulted from the 

 irritant or disturbing action of visiting insects. The whole dis- 

 sertation is interesting and ingenious. 



Beccari, in Malesia, indicates 16 species of Myrmecodia and 29 

 of Hydnophytam. This association with ants is established in 

 many of them. He also describes and figures less remarkable 

 cases of ant-lodgings in stems thereby more or less distorted by 

 enlargements, in a 3Iyristica, in an Endospermum and another 

 of the Euphorbiaceae, a Clerodendron, and in three Palms of the 

 genus Korthalsia. a. g. 



9. Lloyd'' s Drugs and Medicines of North America. — The 

 sixth part, issued in June, 1885, extending from p. 177 to 208, 

 brings to a close the elaborate medical and botanical history of 

 Hydrastis, with 43 bibliographical references to the botany alone. 

 It devotes a good figure and a page of letter-press to Trollius 

 laxus, and for the rest is occupied with Coptis, which is left 

 unfinished. There are excellent figures and dissections of C. 

 trifolia and also of C. occidentalis and C. asplenifolia of the Pa- 

 cific side of the continent, and an elaborate acco^^nt of the 

 minute anatomy of C. trifolia by Louisa Reed Stowell, with 

 copious and admirably drawn illustrations. The main active 

 principle of the plant is said to be berberine. So the single 

 order Manunculacece is likely to fill a volume. a. g. 



10. Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Insti- 

 tute, for 1884, vol. xvii, 1885. — The Botanical papers, p. 214-306, 

 show great activity among the resident botanists of New Zealand, 

 consisting of articles by T. Kirk, W. Colenso, D. Petrie, J. 

 Adams, H. C. Field, and "VV. S. Hamilton. Many new sj)ecies 

 are characterized ; and there are still ample harvests to be gath- 

 ered in these large and diversified islands. a. g. 



11. Revision of the North American Species of the Genus 

 Scleria; by N. L. Beittox. — This forms pages 228-237 of the 

 third volume of the Annals of the New ITorh Academy of /Sci- 

 ences. As the New York Academy is a continuation and amplifi- 

 cation of the former Lyceum of Natural History, which in 



