1877.] Recent Literature. 41 
to supply the deficiency. The present fasciculus, which forms the first 
part of a work of which it is intended that two parts shall be issued 
annually, contains colored plates of Aquilegia Canadensis L., Geranium 
maculatum L., Aster undulatus L., Gerardia flava L., and Gerardia 
tenuifolia Vahl. The artist, Mr. Isaac Sprague, is well known by his 
excellent outline drawings in Gray’s Genera and in the botanical re- 
ports of several of the western surveys. The present plates are ac- 
curate in drawing and brilliant in color, that of the columbine being 
especially striking. The two species of Gerardia are figured on the 
same plate, but, although this is perhaps an advantage in a botanical 
point of view, it must be confessed that the general effect is not pleasing. 
Accompanying the plates are twelve pages of text by Prof. G. L. 
Goodale. The task of describing plants which have a popular interest, 
as in the case of the species figured in the present fasciculus, is by no 
means easy or gracious. The writer is too apt to confine himself to 
vague sentimentalities. This danger Professor Goodale has successfully 
avoided, and instead of copious extracts from Mrs. Hemans an ords- 
worth he has, very much more to the purpose, given quotations from 
Hermann Miiller and Sprengel, writers who, although by no means un- 
familiar to those who have taken a botanical course at Cambridge, are 
probably new to the majority of those who purchase the present work. 
If Mr. Sprague has made the Wild Flowers of America a work which 
will be sought by all lovers of the beautiful, Professor Goodale has 
done no less for those who seek instruction, pleasingly conveyed, with 
regard to our common native plants. The price, $5.00 a part, seems 
rather high, but if, as we learn from the publisher’s announcement, the 
first edition is already nearly exhausted, it cannot be said to be too high. 
Recent Booxs anD PAmPHLETS. — Synopsis of American Wasps. By Dr. 
de Saussure. Solitary Wasps. ( Santieaon Miscellaneous Collections. 254.) 
Washington, D. ©. 1875. 8vo, pp. 385. 
Studien zur Descendenz-theorie. II. Ueber die letzten Ursachen vy Transmuta- 
tionen. Von Prof, August Weismann. Leipzig. 1876. 8vo, pp. 33 
satin Annual Report of the Geological Survey of Indiana, ae during the 
Year 187 bie . T. Cox, State Geologist, assisted by Prof. John Collett, Prof. 
W. W. Bord n, n, and Dr. G. M. Levete. Indianapolis. 1876. 8vo, pp. 601. 
Entomologische Nachrichten. Herausgegeben von Dr. S. Katter. Jahrgang I. 
1875, Heft i., ii. 1876. C.F. Vieweg in Quedlinburg. 8vo. 
erches sur tee Dieyemides, Survivants actuels d’un Embranchement des 
Mésozoaires, Par Édouard Van Beneden. Bruxelles. 1876. 8vo, pp-11l. 3 plates. 
Our Present Knowledge of the Nidification of the American Kinglets. By Ernest 
Ingersoll. (From the Bulletin of the Nuttall Ornithological Club. Vol. i, No. 4. 
November, 1876.) 8vo, pp. 80. 
escriptions of some Vertebrate Remains from the Fort Union Beds of Montana. 
By E. D. Cope. (Extracted from the. rvenedings of the Academy of Natural Sci- 
ences of Philadelphia, October 31, 1876.) 
Increase Allen en Lapham. A ‘A Memorial. me before the Wisconsin Natural His- 
tory Society. By Charles Mann. 8vo, pp. 2 
The Land-Birds and Game-Birds of Kon. England. With Descriptions of the 
