BOOK NOTICES. 



219 



end of Dane's Dyke, and found, in addition to some shells (e.g., Cyprina islandica 

 and Tellina balthica), the following fossils : — Pachastrella convoluta, Seliscothon 

 planus, S. capitata, Thecosiphonia turbusata, Verruailina pustulosa, V. cribrosa, 

 V. miliaria, V. radiata, V. plicata, V. papillata, Scytalia fastigiata, Phymatella 

 reticulata, Siphonia, Bolaspongia globata, Ventriculites infundibuliformis, V. 

 cribrosus, V. angustatus, V. radiatus, V. striatus, Pachimon scriptum, Coscinopora, 

 Spongia plana, S. paradoxica, S. convoluta, Belemnites nmcronata, lerebratula 

 biplicata, Ananchytes ovatus, Marsupites ornatus, Inocerami, and Rhynchonellce. 

 Mr. C. Brownridge, F.G.S., examined the boulder clay for travelled rocks, finding 

 grits and sandstones, mountain limestone, mica schist, conglomerate, quartzite, 

 granites, &c. 



For the section for Micro-Zoology and Botany Mr. J. M. Kirk, one of its 

 secretaries, gave a negative report, the nature of the ground not being such as to 

 repay investigation. A vote of thanks to the chair concluded the meeting. 



BOOK NOTICES. 



The London Catalogue of British Plants. Part I. 8th Edition. 



40 pp., 8vo, 6d. Geo. Bell & Sons. 

 The appearance of a new edition of this time-honoured catalogue has always 

 been an event of the first interest to British botanists, inasmuch as it is a sort of 

 botanical milestone, by which our progress in the local . insular relations of the 

 science can be roughly registered. The first edition with which, alas ! the name 

 of the great master, H. C. Watson, is unassociated, marking as it does a new and 

 significant departure from that master's uniform and consistent method, is trebly 

 eventful. 



It is easy to predict the public verdict, that of the rank and file of botanists who 

 seek to see their way through its bewildering erudition ; unprepared as it will find 

 them, and assuredly without the means— in the shape of descriptive manuals con- 

 forming to its nomenclature — of educating themselves up to its standard : that 

 verdict will be shown in an aversion from making use of it which will result in 

 something akin to ' boycotting ; ' but it is not so easy to criticise it in detail, to 

 point out its many minor errors, its few but undoubted merits, and its great amaz- 

 ing inconsistency, without conveying a false impression. As usual, a conflict of 

 the claims of Authority, Utility, Expediency, has resulted in a somewhat lame 

 compromise. 



The catalogue proper now covers thirty-three and a half pages, affixing a 

 number to 1,858 species, and a letter to some 700 varieties, ' authorities ' being 

 affixed to all these names, but none to the genera — which, numbered consecutively 

 also, reach 542. A lengthy apologetic Preface, acknowledging assistance from, 

 and giving somewhat fulsome praise to, certain botanists ; whilst (according to a 

 review in the Journal of Botany, which we note) making no mention of indebted- 

 ness to the researches of others — e.g., J. Britten and the late R. A. Pryor, without 

 whose work in the direction of a correct nomenclature, the catalogue could not 

 4 have assumed its present appearance ' — is signed by the editor, Mr. F. J. 

 Hanbury. In this preface we are told that the great aim of the catalogue has 

 been 1 utility rather than authority'' — an aim that, we are sorry to say, falls wofully 

 short of the mark in the matter of attainment. It will puzzle most people to say 

 how a catalogue can be useful (except to a dozen or so of our best critical botanists, 

 who work by continental authors) in which the school of botanical body-snatchers 

 have disinterred so very many of truly earliest, but none the less unfamiliar, corpora 

 vili, reinstating them without (in numerous instances) giving as synonyms the 

 better known names, and which do not agree altogether either with those of 

 Babington's or Hooker's well-known floras. The catalogue, as it stands, apart 

 from all its errors of detail, is either too much or too little ; and, seeing that a 

 catalogue is an ever-pressing want, if the present one does not speedily see a second 

 amended issue, the wants of the great bulk of collectors will assuredly be supplied 

 from a source more conservative and less subversive of accepted nomenclature. 



So much for the main feature of the catalogue ; as to details, it is of course a 

 point capable of argument, that since every name (aliens mainly) in the ' excluded ' 

 lists of the old editions could not be inserted, some latitude for various experience 



July 1886. 



