ORGANISED OBSERVATION. 
63 
We have always noticed that for such amateur investigations 
considerable guidance is necessary. The temptation is to fritter 
away powers on vague desultory observations which, if directed 
into one special channel, might produce important results. In 
the paper which immediately follows, Professor Henslow gives 
some valuable suggestions as to conducting investigations into 
the habitats of plants on more definite lines than is usual, 
and also gives instructions for some simple experiments on 
plant environment, which will, we hope, be carried out by some 
of our readers. We would recommend, by the way, those who 
are interested in Professor Henslow’s paper, or in the “Notes” 
of Bishop Mitchinson, to try to get access, if possible, to the 
Cybele Bvitannica, Compendium or Topographical Botany , of Hewett 
Cottrell Watson. There are few works so stimulating to 
research as those of this delightfully pugnacious and eccentric 
writer. Of course every botanist has his well-thumbed and 
annotated copy of the London Catalogue, corrected, as far as is 
in his power, up to date. 
It is to be desired that Mr. Macpherson or some of the other 
ornithologists who contribute to our columns should give some 
hints to the observers of birds about the special points to which 
they may direct their investigations, similar to the guidance 
given by Professor Henslow to botanists. The “ Instructions 
for the Observation of Phenological Phenomena, published by 
the Council of the Meteorological Society” are, in spite of their 
very imposing and grandiloquent title, deplorably meagre. 
Perhaps our entomological authorities would also mention some 
special points in their department of Natural History to which 
lovers of insects might direct their attention. — Ed., N.N.] 
A NEGLECTED PART OF FIELD BOTANY. 
YSTEMATIC botanists are, as a rule, solely concerned 
with morphology. Their plan has been to collect 
jj plants wherever they could find them, examine them 
from root to seed to see in what particulars they agreed 
or differed from their kith and kin, record their observations, and 
then to call them varieties, subspecies, or species, as they con- 
sidered to be the most appropriate term from their individual 
points of view respectively. 
Now, there seems to be something wanting in this procedure, 
and that is, a precise account of the nature of the locality where, 
more especially a variety, or a subspecies is to be found. The 
general locality of a species is mostly given, but looking through 
Sir J. D. Hooker’s Students Flora, now and again the condi- 
tions of the localities of varieties are added, such as “ maritime,” 
“ sandy soil,” &c., but they are mostly few and far between. 
At a time previous to the publication of The Origin of 
