Page:Journal of botany, British and foreign, Volume 9 (1871).djvu/340

 312 NEW PUBLICATIONS.

ultimate |)nrts disseminated; in Dnipes, the -stones ; in Scliizocavps, the mei'icdrps ox joints ; and in Aclienes, the fruits as wholes. As relVactory exceptions, however, may be mentioned those cases where the seed, minus its testa, is the part ultimately disseminated ; for example — in Oxalis where, on dehiscence of the capsule, the elastic testa becomes ruptured, violently expelling the body of the seed with the tegmen ; or in the so-called drupaceous seeds {e. ff. in P/inica), which are doubtless devoured by birds ; and, after digestion of the pulpy testa, the body of the seed, will) the hard tegnien, is evacuated, and dissemination occurs. Or, again, such a drupe as the Apple, where the induriition of the endocarp is slight, we have the fruit behaving as a berry, and dissemination taking place by means of the seeds.

Some botanists may, perhaps, be surprised to note the omission of the terms Siliqua and Silicnla, so universally employed to designate the fruits of CruciferfB. A little reflection, however, is sufficient to make it evident that, if distinctions so triHing in character as those which separate these fruits from other valvular capsules were co;isistently carried out in practice, the terminology would become altogether intolerable. A similar argu- ment may be adduced in favour of the suggestion made in the foregoing table, as to the propriety of devising some common term which will supersede those of Follicle and Letjiiine.

��^eto |)ubIrcati;ons.

Handbook of British Fungi ; with full Dt^scriptions of all the Species, and Illustrations of the Genera. By M. C. CooKE, M.A. London and New York. MacmiUan and Co.' 1871. Pp. 981 ; Figs. 408.

Since the publication of the fifth volume of the ' English Flora' in 1836 — the work of the Uev. M. J. Berkeley, which comprehended all the species that had been discovered in this country up to that time, and in which the characters, together with synonyms and references to figures, were of the most complete kind, — little lias been done, in a systematic wav to enable botanists of moderate means to pursue the study of mycoloo-y. Without access to libraries such as that of Kew or the British Museum, a considerable outlay has been necessary to obtain the books containiuo- the requisite information ; many of these are very scarce, and the subjects treated of ordy in detached papers in the transactions of the learned socie- ties of our own or other countries, and therefore inaccessible to the o-eue- rality of students. The only work comprising all the species indigenous to Great Britain that has appeared since tiiat time, viz. the ' Outlines of British Kungology,' by the author of the first-named work, was published in 1860, but it was so restricted by the publishers as to be of service only to those who possessed the works of Fries and other writers, so far as the more minute forms are concerned, since it contained specific cha- racters of the larger species only, with short descriptions of the fiimilies, orders, and genera, accompanied by a list of the remaining species. During the eleven years that have elapsed since that period, numerous additions have been made to our Flora by a constantly increasing number of observers. It is therefore with great satisfaction that we can now an-

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