1S92.] Recent Literature. 231 



The revision itself follows, the genera in each family being taken ap 

 alphabetically. Details of all kinds abound in notes, etc., and are 

 often very interesting (e. g., notes on proper spelling, on botanical 

 Latin, etc.). But no confusion is produced by them or the revisions 

 of genus-limits and monographs scattered through the work. One 

 thing might be mentioned. He unites Aster and Holidago and inter- 

 mediate groups in the genus Aster, giving quite a full discussion of his 

 reasons. He also works out the proper species-name combinmtiOM 

 whenever he changes a genus-name. Many things might be commented 



the changes. 



Just what the effect of the work will be cannot be foretold. Many 

 of the suggestions will hardly be adopted. Others, it is to be hoped, 

 will be. As the most thorough piece of work yet done in a direction 

 now receiving much attention it must have some influence. Certainly 

 the admirable discussion in the introduction of the defects of our pres- 

 ent nomenclature and the causes of them cannot fail to have consider- 

 able effect, and constitutes the most valuable part of. the work. The 

 author appears in the introduction as a keen and severe, yet on occa- 

 sion, appreciative critic, and if we are to believe his statement that he 

 worked from thirteen to fourteen hours a day for the last three years, 

 no one can charge him with haste, or say as he does of Durand, that 

 he has not put time enough upon his work. 



One acquires a good deal of prejudice against the book on first 

 glancing it over, which disappears on a more thorough reading of the 

 introduction. Paradox as it is, the only way to attain an un. banka- 

 ble and uniform nomenclature is to make chan-es now with an iron 

 hand. " Unambiguous rules and priority," as he ever says, "are the 

 only sound principles by which we can bring order in [to] nomencla- 

 ture. The changes necessitated by priority should 



promptly and as thoroughly as possible, and— as we may wish it— it 

 possible at once, in one book.-RoscoK Pound, Lincoln, M™b,, 

 February 8, 1892. 



Literature of Parasites, No. II.-M. Braun. « Die »ge°an»te 

 freischwimmende Sporocyste." (Centralblatt f. Bakl. u. Par. 1891, 

 X 7, p. 215-219.) , .. . 



In 1885 Prof. Eamsav Wright, of Canada, found a peculiar iree- 

 swimming organism which he considered to be a free-swimming sporo- 

 cyst. Prof. Braun, of Konigsberg, recently found some similar organ- 

 isms, which he traced to Limnueus paliutns var. corvu*. Jiraun ait- 



