70 



The Plant World. 



centimeters below the surface in drier soil. This and the fact 

 that the roots tend to grow horizontally in wet conditions is 

 shown by figures of Cladium, Peucedanum palustre, and Lysim- 

 achia vulgaris. 



Five forest beds have been traced in the peat of the 

 "Fenland" in the marginal parts; these indicate transition 

 between the fen-marsh and the forest of the drier uplands. 

 At the present time, bushes such as Salix, Myrica, Betula, 

 Rhamnus frangula, and Viburnum opulus are increasing and 

 forming thickets; the author regards this as the beginning 

 of another forest period; the factors leading to it are 

 increasing dryness of the fen, due partly to the growth of peat, 

 partly to the effect of drainage. The presence of scattered 

 Quercus and Pyrus aucuparia indicates the advent of a still 

 drier type of forest. 



W. G. Smith, in Botanisches Centralblatt. 



The Plant Geography of the Balkan Peninsula by L. 

 Adamovic, published by the Vienna Academy, recalls the mon- 

 umental industry exemplified in the massive volumes of Engler 

 and Drude's Vegetation der Erde. According to the author 

 the Balkan Peninsula is divided into two parts which, floristi- 

 cally considered, belong respectively to the Mediterranean region 

 and that of middle Europe. The characteristic plants of middle 

 Europe, such as the larch, heather, crowberry and many others, 

 either disappear altogether or occur only sporadically in the 

 Mediterranean region of the peninsula. The boundary between 

 this and the middle European region marks the southern limit 

 of the spruce, pine, birch, etc., and the northern limit of Juni- 

 perus oxycedrus, Buxus, Quercus macedonica, Platanus orientalis 

 and others. Both in the Mediterranean and the middle European 

 divisions of the peninsula eight vertical regions are distinguished, 

 including in each case lowland, submontane, montane, subalpine 

 and alpine floras, in addition to those not common to the two, 

 and in each division four horizontal zones are named from 

 adjacent geographical regions, such as the Adriatic, Hellenic, etc. 



The marshalling and classifying of facts is accomplished 

 with characteristic thoroughness, but, as in many other papers 

 of this kind, no attempt is made to correlate facts of distribution 

 with climatic and edaphic factors, some of which it would seem 



