NOTES AND NEWS. 



71 



Dr. J. A. Erskine Stuart, who, since he became President of the Heckmond- 

 wike Naturalists' Society, has done much to promote its prosperity, has arranged 

 to read before it a series of papers as follows : — October 4th, 'Medicinal Plants'; 

 November ist, 'Linnaeus'; November 29th, ' Poetry and Flowers '; and December 

 7th, 'The Holly.' 



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Although the news is in all the newspapers, we cannot refrain from calling the 

 attention of our readers to the claim which the newly-founded Marine Biological 

 Association has upon their sympathies. It has long been a reproach to wealthy Eng- 

 land that it has had no institution upon its shores to do the work which the Naples 

 Zoological Station does for the Mediterranean Fauna, and now that the association 

 has been founded it is the duty of all who can afford it to contribute towards the 

 successful establishment of its first laboratory. The location of this has been 

 determined for Plymouth Sound by the timely offer from the Corporation of that 

 town of ;!^i,ooo in money and a free site on the foreshores of the Sound. Some 

 day, possibly, we may see a similar laboratory set up in the north. An official 

 memorandum, emanating from the Council, which appeared in Nature for the 7th 

 August (at page 350), gives full details of the Association's intentions and present 

 prospects. 



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The 'Entomologist' Synonymic List of British Lepidoptera is just out. We 

 hope to notice it in an early number. 



>ocX 



A botanist of some little note in his own humble way, of whom no obituary 

 notice has appeared, died on the 29th April last, at 51, Spooner Road, Sheffield, 

 aged 55 years. This was Mr. Amos CaiT. Originally of Frant, on the borders of 

 Kent and Sussex, he afterwards resided near Warwick. For some time he was a 

 rural postman, and whilst such collected most of the critical plants of the districts 

 in which his work lay. For some years he had lived in Sheffield, and although 

 a bootmaker, and much tied to his trade, he contrived to collect indefatigably in- 

 formation as to the Roses, Brambles, and Willows of the Sheffield district. Special 

 help from him in this respect is acknowledged at pp. 359 and 360 of ' West York- 

 shire.' He added Circcea alpina to the flora of the Rivelin valley, and re-discovered 

 or verified many of the old stations in that district, first noticed by Jonathan Salt, 

 Hypericum dubium, Sctdellaria minor. Arbutus uva-ursi, and Cotyledon umbilicus 

 for example. Under a plain appearance and unassuming manner he hid a kindly 

 heart and an almost poetic nature, but with it a most scrupulous accuracy and love 

 of truth. Considering his limited advantages, he added much towards our know- 

 ledge of British Plants ; and although he was never, we believe, lucky enough to 

 discover a species new to the country, he was the first to find Carduus acaulis 

 (the stemless thistle) on Kiveton Common. 



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The veteran Yorkshire botanist, Richard Spruce, Ph.D., F.R.G.S., who is 

 living in seclusion at Castle Howard, and who in his youth did so much good 

 work in exploring the cryptogamic riches of his native county, is publishing 

 through the medium of the ' Transactions of the Botanical Society of Edinburgh ' 

 (of which it constitutes the 15th volume) the results of his labours among the 

 hepatics or liverworts of the tropical regions of South America — amid the varied 

 and luxuriant vegetation of which he spent fourteen years (1849- 1862) of the 

 prime of his life. The first portion of the monograph — which is intituled 

 ' Hepaticse Amazinge et Andinse ' — was issued last April. This part, bulky as 

 it is, treats of three genera only, Frullania, Jubula, and Lejeunia, the latter 

 enormous genus with its numerous species ranged under 37 subgenera, occupying 

 nearly the whole of it. The second part, which will not be many months before 

 it appears, will include (besides the remainder of the descriptions of genera and 

 species and 16 plates) the introduction to the whole work, wherein one may expect 

 to have such generalizations on geographical distribution, classification, and 

 generic affinities as the matured judgment and critical acumen of one of our best 

 authorities on the hepaticse well qualify him to make. 



Oct. 1884. 



