36 
KEYIEWS. 
says, “ is to afford the means of determining (i.e. ascertaining the 
name of) any plant growing in it, whether for the purpose of ulte¬ 
rior study or of intellectual exercise.” Here then is one test of 
primary importance, which we may try to apply to our three books. 
It is well to bear in mind that these works are consulted by two sets 
of persons—those who have a tolerably fair idea of the affinities of 
nearly every plant they gather, say know its genus or Natural Order 
-—and those who have little or no conception of the kind. Although 
Prof Babington intends his volume as a field-book or companion “ for 
botanists,” yet there seems no question, that he means it to be made 
use of also by beginners and amateurs, as do the authors of the other 
two works ; Mr. Bentham expressly designing his Handbook for the 
use of such. 
So far as these unfortunate beginners are concerned, we feel satis¬ 
fied that in 9 cases out of 10, or at any rate 5 out of 6, they must 
experience great difficulty—much greater than it is easy for us to 
appreciate—in overcoming the obstacles presented by the first page 
of these Ploras. A difficulty which we need not enter upon further 
than to observe, that it appears to us to be as well met as it is pos¬ 
sible to be by Mr. Bentham, in the “ Analytical Key” prefixed to 
his work : necessarily artificial, as he tells us, but none the less 
useful as a means to the “ principal object” of the book. This plan 
bas been adopted also by Prof. Babington, in the last edition of his 
Manual. It has been suggested to us, by one well experienced, that 
these keys might advantageously be preceded by an enumeration of 
the two or three anomalous Natural Orders or inferior groups, which 
are not intelligibly amenable to such treatment by curt alternatives. 
Coniferse, Lemnaceae, and Loranthaceae are examples of such groups, 
in respect of which botanists are not always agreed as to their 
structure They are plants which young students have no reason¬ 
able chance of comprehending. The suggestion is worth entertain¬ 
ing, though we do not think that in the case of Air. Bentham’s 
skilful analysis it is required. Prof. Babington says, that his “ Analy¬ 
tical Key,” on the plan of the French School of Botanists, has been 
“ slightly modified, so as to be less likely to mislead.” We fear 
more might too truly be substituted for less. The first pair of alter¬ 
natives in his key—leaves straight-veined or net-veined — is one 
which the student must often find it very difficult to decide upon. 
Indeed the author himself, unless he can show the common Arum to 
have straight veins, must fail to trace it through bis zigzags. The 
Mistletoe is another common plant, of which Prof. Babington’s key 
makes a sad mess. The method of an analytical key to the Natural 
Orders and anomalous groups, and then in their turn to genera and 
species, is, of course, by no means new, having indeed been used so long 
ago as in the French Flora of Lamarck and He Candolle, though never 
generally in works on the British Flora. It is not without an objec¬ 
tion, in the absolute character of its brief alternatives, and their in¬ 
compatibility in a manner with the defiant variability and vagueness 
