Botany and Zoology. 



137 



He also maintains that the true fecundated spores of the Floridece are 

 those of the conceptacles ; while the tetraspores belong to non-sexual 

 reproduction, like that by buds. Bisexual reproduction is now known in 

 every group of Algse except the Spirogyrece and the Desmidiacece, in 

 which spores are formed by conjugation, and in Oscillaria and its allies. 



A. G. 



4. Martins: Flora Braziliensis : Fasc. xv, Sept. 1855. — This new part 

 comprises, (1.) the Alstroemeriese, by A. Schenck, of Wiirtzburg, with 2 

 plates ; (2.) the Agavew, by Prof, von Martius himself, with a complete 

 bibliography of Agave Americana, a detailed account of the uses to which 

 it has been applied and of the products it yields ; also an excursus on 

 other Brazilian plants which furnish fibrous textile materials, all imbued 

 with the profound learning and the large and genial views which dis- 

 tinguish this eminent naturalist. (3.) The Xyridew, Mayacew, and Com- 

 melinacece, by Prof. Seubert of Carlsruhe, with 16 plates. And lastly 

 there are 1 additional Tabula? physiognomical (tab. 42-48), of much 

 interest and beauty, with four more pages of explanatory letter-press rela- 

 ting to this part of the work. These plates, with the accompanying 

 text, will at length form a volume by itself, of unusual interest ; one in 

 which the peculiar powers of Dr. von Martius' philosophical and exuberant 

 mind, richly stored with the most various learning, as well as his almost 

 unrivalled talents and advantages as an observer, are shown to great 

 advantage. 



The retirement of Dr. von Martius from the botanical chair, and from 

 the administration of the Botanical Garden at Munich, — relieving him 

 from many distracting labors and cares, begins to show good results, in 

 the more energetic prosecution of the flora of the great empire of Brazil, 

 — a work which we ardently hope the distinguished author may live 

 fully to complete, and in the same thorough manner in which it has thus 

 far been carried on. We have perused with great satisfaction M. De- 

 Candolle's genial and instructive Notice sur la Vie et les Ouvrages de 

 M. de Martius: publiee a Voccasion de sa retraite des functions actives 

 de Venseignement, in the Bibliotheque Universelle ; and are prevented 

 from republishing it in this Journal for want of room ; and partly also 

 from the consideration that the time most proper for even so well-deserved 

 an eulogy has not arrived while the subject of it is yet, as we trust, only 

 midway in his high scientific career. a. g. 



5. Francois Andre Michaux, the veteran author of the North Ameri- 

 can Sylva, died suddenly of apoplexy, in November last, at his residence 

 near Pontoise, France, aged about 86. There yet survive some in this 

 country to whom he was personally known, either in his first visit, in 

 1802, or in his second, in 1806, during which he travelled widely over 

 the United States, and collected the materials of the work which has as- 

 sociated his name for all time with the trees of North America. It is 

 interesting to know that he preserved his strength and activity to the 

 last ; even the last day of his life was in part devoted to planting in his 

 grounds American trees of his own rearing. He was accustomed to walk 

 from Pontoise up to Paris, a distance of nineteen miles, and back again 

 the same day, at least once every month, even within the last year. The 



SECOND SERIES, VOL. XXII. NO. 64. — JULY, 1856. 18 



