284 Scientific Intelligence. 



treatment of the genus. An Arctic-alpine form of Campanula 

 rotundlfolia has been known to us as var. Arctica, yet that name 

 is not given as a synonym of var. Langsdorffiana. A common 

 iAizula in the White Mountains and northern Maine has been 

 familiar as L. spadicea, var. melanocarpa, but under its more 

 recent alias, Juncoides parvifiorum, Coville, the more familiar 

 synonym is not mentioned. In the so-called Botanical Club Check 

 List the plant which we have known and which is now kept up as 

 Puecinellia maritima, was called Panicularia maritima ; yet for 

 some reason this name does not occur in the Illustrated Flora 

 synonymy. One of the familiar White Mountain grasses has 

 long passed as Agrostis canina, var. alpina, Oakes. In the 

 Botanical Club Check List, Professor Scribner made a new com- 

 bination, Agrostis rubra, L., var. alpina; but now in the Illus- 

 trated Flora the plant is called Agrostis rubra, and both the 

 Check List name and the other are quite omitted from the 

 synonymy. 



In many particulars, then, the Illustrated Flora is hardly 

 what we should like to see it. In most groups where the rep- 

 resentation of minute details is important the figures can be used 

 only with hesitation. The descriptions also, to one whose time 

 is of value, are far from satisfactory. Printed in one style of 

 type and often filled out with non-essential details, they are not 

 readily interpreted. Unfortunately, too, the descriptions and the 

 accompanying figures are often contradictory ; and in the state- 

 ment of geographic ranges there has been so general an ignoring 

 of well known and accessible data, that one can feel little confi- 

 dence that the ranges of most species are given with even approxi- 

 mate accuracy. 



On the other hand, there are fortunately some notable excep- 

 tions to the general run of figures. In the Naiadacece, Alismacece, 

 Graminece, Juncacem, Polygonacece, and a few other families, 

 most details are well brought out and the illustrations promise 

 to be helpful. In the adoption of the Engler and Prantl system 

 of arrangement too, the Illustrated Flora has taken a wise step ; 

 and in spite of its inaccuracies and inconsistencies, when one 

 wishes to gain from the Illustrated Flora only a general impres- 

 sion of the plant, it is certainly a great convenience. As a 

 work for such reference it will find a welcome place in many 

 libraries. m. l. fernald. 



Obituary. 



Professor James Hall, State Geologist ot New York from 

 ]836 to 1898, died at Bethlehem, N. H., on August 7th, at the 

 advanced age of eighty-seven years. A notice is deferred until 

 another number. 



