95 



with a sufficient number of copies in reserve; but there are now 

 less than 300 copies of the first volume on hand, and those w ho 

 think of purchasing should do so at once. 



BOOKS AND WRITERS. 

 — Since the publication of the "Illustrated Flora/' by Britton 

 & Brown, Dr. Britton has been at work upon a manual covering 

 the Northern States and Canada, which should embody in a 

 single volume all the essential features of the larger work except 

 the illustrations. This has now appeared from the press of Henry 

 Holt & Co., and is entitled "A Manual of the Mora of the North 

 Eastern States and Canada." It is a very creditable example of 

 book making-, and although containing nearly a thousand more 

 descriptions than the 6th edition of "Gray's Manual," is a some- 

 what smaller volume. To one who has no personal interest in the 

 matter the book contains much to praise, as well as much to con- 

 demn. It is the first manual of our flora to be arranged according 

 to the Engler-Prantl sequence of orders and of special value on 

 this account. The greatest interest in this work, however, centers 

 in the author's use of nomenclature and in his treatment of genera 

 and species. One who turns from the well known "Gray's 

 Manual" to its new rival will be met not only by a bewildering 

 array of new scientific names, but by an equally perplexing num- 

 ber of "new species" or sub-species. Frequently, but not fre- 

 quently enough, the descriptions of the latter are followed by the 

 significant phrase, "probably a mere form." Nevertheless each 

 is dignified by a trinomial in sounding Latin or Greek and backed 

 up by a double citation of authorities. As an example of the 

 changes in names we may take the order Orchidaceae. Jn 

 "Gray's Manual" this contains seventeen families; in Britton's 

 the number has grown to twenty-six, the additional families in- 

 volving a change of names in no less than twenty-three species 

 out of a total of fifty-two in the first named work. [Moreover, the 

 "Illustrated Flora." published in 1896, contained six generic 

 names that differed from those in "Gray's Manual," while the 



