No. 382.] REVIEWS OF RECENT LITERATURE. 805 
subjects, it is really an outline text-book, with directions for the 
practical demonstration of the facts which in an ordinary text-book 
stand simply as statements on authority. The student who has 
worked through it should be an expert and well-trained physiologist ; 
if not, he may ask himself if he had not better turn his attention to 
other things. Unfortunately, the usual college elective does not allow 
time for making expert specialists, and the teacher who can devote 
but a short time to experimental physiology is likely to prefer one of 
the smaller and cheaper books for the direct guidance of his classes, 
though he cannot afford to allow them to do-their work without 
constant reference to the more comprehensive handbooks, foremost 
among which stands this of Detmer. T. 
Minnesota Botanical Studies. — In January, 1894, Bulletin No. 9 
of the Geological and Natural History Survey of Minnesota was begun 
as an occasional serial, the intention being to page the parts consecu- 
tively until a volume should be completed. In March, 1898, the twelfth 
part was issued, completing the first volume of the Buletin. This 
volume contains fifty separate articles by twenty authors, dealing with 
a wide range of subjects, by no means confined to Minnesota 
geographically. It is illustrated by eighty-one plates or maps, and, 
as completed with its very full index, contains 1093 pages octavo. 
While unlimited praise cannot be bestowed on all of its contents, it 
is a valuable addition to the shelves of any botanical library which 
may be fortunate enough to possess it; but one cannot help wonder- 
ing at the liberality of the State Survey of Minnesota in allowing so 
much matter wholly foreign to the usual purposes of such surveys 
to be published and distributed at the expense of the state. T. 
Edible Fungi. — To the already rather copious literature intended 
to facilitate discrimination between edible and poisonous fungi, 
Professor Farlow has recently added a small conservatively written 
article, which has been reissued in pamphlet form from the Yearbook 
of the Department of Agriculture for 1897." Limiting himself to a 
very few species of both classes, which are accurately and yet tersely 
described in language which should be readily understood by any 
person of intelligence, the writer states a few rules which “should 
not be neglected by the beginner ” in the following words : 1. Avoid 
1 Farlow, W.G. Some Edible and Poisonous Fungi. Washington, Government 
Printing Office, 1898. United States Department of Agriculture, Division of 
Vegetable Physiology and Pathology, Bull. Vo. 15. 18 pp. 10 pls., °. 
