The indexes for the first four volumes of this magazine 
have been published and ma}- be had for the asking by any 
reader who owns these volumes. The "cop^^" for indexes 
to all the other volumes is now readj- for the printer and 
we expect will soon l)e issued. 
For some ^-ears the editor has been preparing a book 
on the fern allies and this was recently issued by the F. A- 
Stokes Compan v of New York. The fern allies comprise a 
curious company of plants that, with the ferns, constitute 
the Pteridopbyta one of the four great groups into which 
the plant kingdom is divided by botanists. They stand 
midway iTetween the mosses and the flowering plants; in 
fact bridge the gap between the two. Among them ma\' 
be found the scouring rushes, the ground pines, the quill 
wortSjthe selaginellas, the pepper-worts and many others 
whose strange forms and unusual manner of fruiting 
make them attractive to the collector and plant lover. 
One of the chief reasons for putting this book together 
was the fact that there are no other books that treat 
of the subject in an untechnical way. The plants are 
mentioned in all works devoted to the Fteridophyta, 
but the beginner cannot always identify his plants from a 
brief technical description. A large number of these spe- 
cies, too, have never l>ecn previously illustrated, and some 
of those that have, were published in works not easily ac- 
cessible totht; novice. In the present volume all have been 
illustrated and descrilx^d in untechnical lanj£u;igc and there 
are additional helps to the identification of Uk- ,^iH.'cies in 
the sha]K' ..f seven kevs. The life historv of each specie^^ 
has been given so Xiu as ka..>v.n. It rs expected that the 
'oeginner will now be able to identify his plants with ease, 
'i)ut if th.c users of this book meet with any perplexities in 
the process, the erlitor will l>e glad to set matters right if 
specimens are sent to him. 
