SHORT NOTES.

REMARKS ON SOME CASUAL PLANTS OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE.—Northamptonshire is certainly not poor in introduced plants. Perhaps the richest habitat for these is in the neighbourhood of the sewage works, the sides of the depositing tanks being covered with a rich and peculiar flora. Lepidium Draba, L., is one of its chief constituents, seeding freely: this plant also occurs in several parts of the country, and promises in time to be a perfect weed. Erysimum cheiranthoides, L., occurs rarely, although very frequent on the railbanks about Blisworth and Kingsthorpe. Sisymbrium Sophia, L., rivals L. Draba in abundance, covering not only the sides of the tanks, but growing out of the brickwork and on the rubbish heaps all about the works. This plant occurs generally in the Nene Valley, although not very persistent in its localities. This year, on some ground frequently flooded, among undoubted indigenous plants, such as Ranunculus sceleratus, Polygonum Hydropiper, &c., occurred a single specimen of a Lythrum, which, except for the unusually large flowers, I took to be L. Hyssopifolia, but having sent Mr. Baker a portion of it he named it L. flexuosum, Lag. Specimens of Tragopogon porrifolius, L., occurred last year. Solanum. nigrum, L., a very local plant in Northants, occurs in garden ground near the works: and Datura Stramonium is very frequent; this plant has occurred in cultivated ground on this side of the town for many years, in some places being a perfect pest. Hyoscyamus niger, L., formerly an abundant plant round Northampton, has now. disappeared. Verbascum virgatum was frequent last year, but is absent now. As might be expected, the Chenopods form an important constituent of this sewage flora. Chenopodium olidum, Curt., is frequent. C. album is abundant, its three varieties, candicans, viride and paganum, being readily separable, viride being the most frequent. C. hybridum, L., very abundant, and is a common plant about Northampton. C. rubrum, L., most abundant and exceedingly variable as to height; fertile specimens may be gathered from one and a half inch to four feet high. Setaria viridis, Beauv., is generally to be found. Panicum miliaceum, an occasional plant. Polypogon monspeliensis, Desf., plentiful this year. Symphytum asperrimum, Bieb., noticed this year, by the Nene banks above Mr. Perry's mill, possibly introduced from the skin washing higher up the river. This year have occurred Medicago denticulata, Willd., and M. maculata, Sibth., in great plenty, and some few specimens of Trifolium resupinatum, L., also were found.-G. C. DRUCE.

EUPHORBIA PILOSA AND PALUSTRIS--- These two plants are probably forms of one species, which is found near Bath. It is admitted in the 'Student's Flora,' ed. 1, and excluded from ed. 2 without remark. But it has been known in the place where it now grows for 300

years, as it was seen there by L'Obel before 1576 (See his 'Stirpium Historia,' 194). It was also seen there by Thom. Johnson and his friends in 1634, as stated in his Mercurius Botanicus,' which I have before me. I believe that I was the first to call attention to it in my Fl. Bathoniensis' in 1833, and the late Edw. Forster wrote about it in Linn. Trans.', xvii. 523. The old authors say that it is found "by a wood-side some miles south of Bathe." And L'Obel adds that it was "in sylva de Joannis Coltes prope Bathoniam " that he found it. I have seen it in what is in all probability the same wood, as well as in the lane where it is usually looked for. I may also refer to my Fl. Bath. Suppl.'-90, for the statement of the same facts. I venture to think that we ought not to exclude a plant of 300 years' standing without showing some reason, and that a valid one, which is not done in the Student's Flora.'-C. C. BABINGTON.

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A NEW LOCALITY FOR TEUCRIUM BOTRYS.-We are indebted to Mr. H. Peirson for specimens of this very rare British species, collected by him in August last, in a locality a little distance to the south of Addington, in Surrey, near the Kentish boundary. This is at a considerable distance from the Boxhill station, to which it is quite similar in character, namely, a very dry barren field on the slope of a valley on the chalk. Perhaps some of our Surrey or London botanists may already know of this locality, but it has not, we believe, been previously recorded in print.

CHATOCEROS ARMATUM, T. West.-This filamentous Diatom was found by me on the Norfolk coast at Scratley, near Yarmouth, in 1851, and was the subject of a paper by Tuffen West, which appeared in the Trans. Microsc. Soc.', with a figure, vol. viii. pl. 7. There was some doubt expressed as to the nature of this Diatom, as some naturalists considered it to be the case of an Annelid, but the paper referred to has, I think, settled the question. It has been found on various parts of the coast since. Last July I met with it in great abundance at Hunstanton, Norfolk.-HAMPDEN G. GLASS

POOLE.

URTICA PILULIFERA, L., used to be found growing pretty freely at Lowestoft, Suffolk, some years ago. This season only three or four small plants were to be seen in the old locality by the side of a wall on the lower road between the sea and the town.HAMPDEN G. GLASSPOOLE.

Notices of Books and Memoirs.

Memoirs of the Botanic Garden at Chelsea, belonging to the Society of Apothecaries of London. By the late HENRY FIELD, Esq. Revised, corrected, and continued to the present time, by R. H. SEMPLE, M.D. London printed by Gilbert and Rivington. 1878.

THE editor of this interesting history of the old Chelsea Garden may be congratulated on the happy manner in which he has executed his work, and carried on its memorials to the present day. Mr. Field's original book was printed in 1820, and though fifty-eight years is but a short time in the history of a city company, yet this period has seen such an extension of London westward that the Apothecaries' Physic Garden is now completely within its bounds, and subject to all the baneful influences of its smoke-laden atmosphere. The formation a few years back of the Chelsea embankment has still further altered the physical characters of the garden, and destroyed completely the picturesque river front. In spite of all changes, however, the Society has steadfastly held on to their tenure, and continued, at a large cost, to keep up the scientific character of their garden. It must be allowed that the Society deserves well of botanists, and has contributed largely in the past, often in the face of difficulties and discouragements, to foster and facilitate the study of plants. That it is still animated by the same spirit is evidenced by the present state of the garden and by the examination for women founded in this year. The book is much fuller than Field's, and contains a portrait of Sir Hans Sloane, the donor of the land, a charming view of the garden from the river, several plans, and a complete list of the plants cultivated at the present time, drawn up by the well-known curator, Mr. Thomas Moore. The only want is an index of names of persons mentioned in the book. There are several interesting biographical sketches of botanists who have been connected with the garden, the last being that of Mr. N. B. Ward, who took a prominent part in restoring and maintaining it in a state of scientific efficiency. The memoir of Mr. Thomas Wheeler, for forty-two years Demonstrator of Botany to the Society, is written with much freshness, evidently from personal remembrance. Dr. Semple has indeed clearly been animated throughout by a love of his work, and has given us a little book which cannot fail to be read with interest and pleasure. H. T.

Anthophyta quæ in Japonia legit beat. Emanuel Weiss, Med. Dr. et

quæ museo nationali hungarico procuravit Joannes Xanthus, mus. nat. conserv., enumerat AUGUSTUS KANITZ. BudaPesth. 1878.

THIS is a simple enumeration, with localities, of the plants gathered by the Austro-Hungarian Expedition in Japan. Scarcely

any of the species seem rare ones, but we may mention Lophatherum japonicum, Steud., Paulownia tomentosa, Thbg., Phtheirospermum japonicum, Thbg., Leonurus macranthus, Max., Gentiana Buergeri, Miq., Pertya scandens, Schz. Bip., var. ovata, Impatiens Textori, Miq., Selinum Japonicum, Fr. & Sav., and Desmodium Oldhami, Oliv. The author promises a further memoir on Japanese plants, leaving us to suppose that he has merely printed here the names of species which he was able to determine. S. M.

HENRICI G. REICHENBACH fil., Otia botanica Hamburgensia. Fasciculus primus, Hamburg, 1878.

FIVE papers are brought together in this fasciculus, namely, an account of the orchids gathered by F. C. Lehmann in Eguador, by Godefroy-Lebeuf in Cambodia, by the United States exploring expedition of 1838-42, and by Schweinfurth in Ethiopia, as well as an account, supplementary to the well-known one in the Linnean Transactions,' of the treasures secured by Parish at Moulmein. The first contains descriptions of several new species of Masdevallia, Stelis, Epidendrum, Odontoglossum, &c. In the second we notice the names of Gymnadenia Galeandra, Rchb. f., a species known from China, Hong-Kong, Assam, and Khasia, Habenaria Rumphii, Ldl., Peristylis goodyeroides, Ldl., Cymbidium pendulum, Sw., and Dendrobium crumenatum, Sw. The memoir on Schweinfurth's plants also includes stray notes on and descriptions of other orchids from Africa, with a diagnosis of a new genus Pteroglossaspis (near Cyrtopera); Schweinfurth has found Habenaria cirrhata, Rchb., f. hitherto known only from Madagascar, and this discovery is compared with that of Angræcum eburneum, Thouars, a species recently gathered by Wakefield in Nyika country.

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S. M.

An interesting lecture delivered at the Geographical Society by Mr. Thiselton Dyer, on Plant-distribution as a field for geographical research," is printed in the Society's 'Proceedings' for 1878 (vol. xxii., No. 6).

Dr. D. Moore, of Glasnevin, has described in the Scientific Proceedings of the Royal Dublin Society a supposed new Ceratozamia, C. fusca-viridis. The specimen is in the collection at Glasnevin, came from Havanna, and is said to be native of Cuba. It is nearly allied to C. longifolium, Regel, but differs from the description of that species in its globose stem and very long recurved leaves with the leaflets fuscous-brown beneath.

From Mr. Roper's notes on the additions to the Fauna and Flora of the Cuckmere district (Sussex) during 1878, it is gratifying to see that no less than 135 fresh species of plants have been found, thirty-one being Phanerogams.

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The great Flora Brasiliensis' has made very rapid progress this year. Another part is to hand, Fasc. 97, dated 1st September, and containing the second portion of the Graminea worked out by

Doell.

Gymnopogon fastigiatus, Nees, is made a new genus, Monochate, allied to Leptochloa, but differing in its fewer flowers. There are forty-three plates.

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OTHER NEW BOOKS.-F. HEGELMAIER, Vergleichende Untersuchungen über Entwicklung dicotyledoner Keime.' Stuttgart, Schweizerbart, 1878 (8 mk.)-H. NORDLINGER,Querschnitte von Hundert Holzarten,' Bd. viii. Stuttgart, Cotta, 1878 (5 mk.) TODARO, Relazione sulla cultura dei Cottoni in Italia, sequita da una Monografia del genere Gossypium.' Rome and Palermo, 1877-8 (with 12 folio plates).-MRS. LANKESTER Talks about Plants, or early lessons in Botany.' Griffith and Farrar, 1879.

ARTICLES IN JOURNALS.-OCTOBER, 1878.

Botanische Zeitung.-B. Frank, On some parasitic Fungi causing leaf-staining diseases.'-- Scharlok, On the flowers of Collomia.-K. Goebel, 'On root-shoots of Anthurium longifolium.'— M. Traube, 'On the mechanical theory of cell-growth and the history of the theory.'

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Flora.-A. de Krempelhuber, Lichenes coll. in republ. Argentina a Lorentz et Hieronymus.'-F. de Thuemen, Symbolæ ad floram mycologicam Australiæ,' ii.-M. Gandoger, 'Rosæ novæ Galliæ' (continued).--W. Nylander, Circa Lichenes Corsicanos adnotationes.-W. J. Behrens, 'Anatomico-physiological investigations on the nectaries of flowers.'- A. Borzi, Supplement to morphology and biology of Nostochacea.'

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Oesterr. Bot. Zeitschr.-W. O. Focke, 'A case of inefficiency of certain pollen.'-J. Hinterhuber, Typha minima, Hoppe.'-Schulze, Mycological notes.'-F. Hauck, Note on Rhizophydium Dicksonii.' —J. Dedecek, Short excursion to Jeschken and Mileschauen in N. Bohemia.-R. F. Solla, Flora of neighbourhood of Görz' (continued).-S. Schunk, Flora of Val d'Agordo and Val di Fassa.'

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Nuovo Giorn. Bot. Ital.-G. Archangeli, ' On Fistulina hepatica' (tab. 11).-G. Bertoloni, Further observations on the disease "falchetto" of the mulberry' (tab. 12).

American Naturalist.-W. J. Beal, How thistles spin.'-E. Palmer, Plants used by the Indians of the United States' (continued).

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Bull. Soc. Bot. France (xxiv., 3).-Boulay, A new eradicator for collecting aquatics' (tab. 7).-M. Cornu, Development of Agaricus cirrhatns from a sclerotium.'-Lefèvre, Reproductions of Rubus by implantation of extremity of leafy shoot.'-P. Petit, 'Can desiccation kill Diatoms?'-Viaud-Grandmarais and Menier, Botany of Ile d'Yeu, Vendée.'-Beauregard, Structure and development of fruit of Daphne' (tab. 10).-P. Duchartre, 'Observations on double flowers of Lilies, especially of L. tigrinum.'