Page:Journal of botany, British and foreign, Volume 34 (1896).djvu/437

 BOOK-UOTBS, NEWS, ETC. 407 Oesterr, Bot. Zeitschrift (Aug.). — G. Wagner, ' Zum Generations- wechsel von Melampsora tremula.' — V. Schiffner, ' Ueber die von Sintenis in Tiirkisch-Armenien gesammelten Kryptogamen.' — F. Matouschek, ' Ueber zwei neue Fetasites-Ba^sts^Yde aus Bohmen ' (1 pi.).— F. Arnold, ' Lichenologische Fragmente.' — 0. von Seemen, ' Ueber die Diagnose fiir Salix triandra.' BOOK-NOTES, NEWS, dc. The Flora of Tropical Africa has received the attention of the House of Commons. On Aug. 7th the First Commissioner of Works was asked, ''if the duty of preparing works on the African flora was entrusted to Mr. Dyer, of Kew Gardens, nearly twenty years ago ; whether he is aware that this gentleman has published practically nothing on the subject; and whether he will urge Mr. Dyer either to complete the work or to abandon it, so as no longer to discourage private enterprise in the same field." In reply, Mr. Akers-Douglas said, *' The third volume of the Flora of Tropical Africa was published in 1877. In 1891 the Treasury authorized the completion of the work in four more volumes, under Mr. Dyer, of Kew Gardens, on the understanding that one volume would be published every two years. No further volume has yet been issued, although portions of one are in type. Mr. Dyer has been urged to complete the work as rapidly as possible." This is satisfactory as far as it goes, but Lord Salisbury and the numerous other persons who feel the importance of completing this long-neglected work must not depend too much upon the result of a question in the House. At least four times, the delay in publishing the Guide to the Gardens — the most generally useful of all the Kew publications — has been brought forward in the House of Commons : as far back as 1892 the then First Commissioner said it was " almost ready, and they hoped to have it out during the summer " — a statement which was received with laughter and a reminder that " a precisely similar answer " had been given fourteen months before. For six or eight summers at least, the thousands of visitors to Kew Gardens have been unable to obtain any guide to the vegetable wonders they see around them, and this must seriously interefere with the value of the Gardens as an educational insti- tution. When the Times (March 22, 1892) told us that "no reasonable man can doubt that the publication of the Bulletin is one of the most useful functions discharged by Kew Gardens," we ventured to deprecate the unfavourable inference which might fairly be drawn as to the slight value of Kew before that erratic little publication entered upon its eccentric career. Now that the Bulletin seems to have been dropped, we think that our warning is amply justified ; for no one will deny that, however unsatisfactory it may have proved as to its publications, Kew has exercised great influence for good