40 
HE VIEWS. 
but at considerable cost of space, which, however, we do not begrudge, 
although the more general information upon the distribution of each 
plant, afforded by Mr. Bentham, appears to us better worth it. This 
forms a marked and most instructive feature in his book, and its 
tendency we conceive to be wholesome. It would of course be 
impossible to carry it out in respect to the segregated forms of Mr. 
Babington, most of which are merely local variations of species as 
we have already stated. With regard to the introduction of English 
names on a uniform plan, in correspondence with the Linnean 
binomial method, by Mr. Bentham, we confess we do not see much 
advantage in it, and prefer the common names when generally recog¬ 
nized, with their omission when not thus distinguished, to the 
adoption of the Latin as English, or of uncouthly Anglized names, as 
Water Catabrose, Bed Centranth, Changing Myosote, Ox-tongue 
Helminth, &c. Opposite Chrysosplene rather shatters the poetry of 
the favourite G-olden Saxifrage. 
We cannot conclude this short notice of our Manuals of Descrip¬ 
tive Botany without noting how desirable it is that our observers 
should direct their attention, more than we believe has been their 
wont, to the life-phenomena of plants, w r hich have been too greatly 
neglected by us. Mr. Darwin’s late publications on Primula and 
the Orchids are admirable examples, in every way, of the kind of 
research we have in view ; so are the papers of Irmisch and others in 
the “ Botanische Zeitung.” Observations of this kind require time, 
much patience, and close watching, winter as well as summer; but 
they are just the kind we are in primary need of now. A pas¬ 
sage in the last Anniversary Address of the President of the Lin¬ 
nean Society is so apropos that w T e copy it here.—“ How little do 
we know of the real history of the life of those sets of plants upon 
whose external forms volumes have been published! * * * # We 
have had enough of splitting of hairs and counting of spots, and of 
idle controversies as to whether they indicate species, varieties, or 
individual differences. Let us adopt for the insects and plants of 
our islands the nomenclature and classification the most convenient 
for study, and devote our attention to their economy and develop¬ 
ment, to the complicated structures disclosed by the microscope, and 
to those innumerable influences which we term accidental, but which 
appear all to form part of one general plan for the balance of power 
in the natural world.” 
It would be a useful addition to our Eloras and need not take up 
much room, were indications scattered through them, under the 
species which promise to be most inviting, of the relations which still 
remain obscure concerning them, especially in such matters as the 
hybernation of perennials and apparent impossibility of cross-fertili¬ 
sation, or of self-fertilisation of flowers. 
