provements in this most difficult and interesting department of botany. We muft fay we have been difappointed. In fact, the account of the clafs Cryptogamia, is by far the most fuperficial and unfatisfactory part of the book. While more than twenty pages are occupied with difquifitions on vegetable irritability, and as many in differtations on the naming of plants after diftinguished botanists, the investigations and difcoveries of Hedwig in the order of Mufci, are despatched in a couple of pages! Under Alga we confidently looked for a distinct statement of the Methodus Lichenum of Dr Acharius, whofe writings form a new era in cryptogamic botany;' but we were mortified to find the amount of the information furnished to be, that the faid Acharius ⚫ had divided lichens into genera, founded on the receptacle of the feeds alone.' Three or four of the new terms invented by this author, are then briefly explained; and Dr Smith paffes on to the fubmerfed algae! The account of thefe is, if poflible, ftill more flimfy. We are told that they are named Ulva, Conferva, Fucus, &c. and that fome of them abound in fresh water; others in the dea; whence the latter are commonly denominated fea-weeds.' This appears to us to be little more fatisfactory than the explanation of Alge to be found in Dr Johnfon's English Dictionary, Herbs growing on the fea-fhore;' only Dr Smith gets them fairly into the water. We may here mention, that Mr Dawson Turner has announced, that when he fhall have finished his Hiftoria Fucorum, (a learned and elegant work now publishing, adorned with beautiful and correct figures, chiefly from the mafterly pencil of W. J. Hooker Efq. of Norwich), he intends to propose a new arrangement and a fubdivifion of the genus Fucus. As to the fungi or muthrooms, Dr Smith's information is almost as defective. By fome naturalifts,' we are told, in a loofe and inaccurate way, they have been thought of an animal nature, chiefly becaufe of their fetid fcent in decay.' A flight notice of Perfoon's divifion of them into Angifcarpi, or those which bear feeds internally, and Gymnocarpi, or thofe which have them imbedded in an appropriate membrane, closes the account of fungi: and the chapter on Cryptogamia,-a chapter as unlike what it ought to be, as it is unlike the reft of the volume. Practical directions for forming a hortus siccus are given in conclusion. If plenty of paper be used, the plants, we are told, dry best without being shifted. Heaths and many other undershrubs, that throw off their leaves in the course of drying, by a continued effort of the living principle, may be prevented from doing so by immersion in boiling water, which destroys that principle. Dried specimens are best preserved by being fastened with weak carpenter's gluc to paper, so that they may be turned over without damage. A half sheet of a convenient size should be allotted to each species; and all the species of a genus may be placed in one or more whole sheets. This is the plan of the Linnean herbarium.' Collections of dried plants are exposed to the depredations of insects, especially the little beetle called ptinus far. Dr Smith has found a solution of corrosive sublimate in rectified spirits of wine, about two drachms to a pint, with a little camphor, particularly efficacious as a preventive. The liquor is to be applied, with a hair pencil, to the plant when perfectly dried, and ready to be deposited in the herbarium. Lastly, the herbarium should be kept under lock and key. This concluding caveat is not indeed delivered, totidem verbis, by Dr Smith: we collect it from the sad experience of M. Cusson of Montpelier, who, we are told, bestowed more pains upon the Umbelliferæ than any other botanist had ever done. But his labours met with a most ungrateful check, in the unkindness, and still more mortifying stupidity of his wife, who, on his absence from home, destroyed his whole herbarium, scraping off the dried specimens, for the sake of the paper on which they were pasted!' (p. 417.) We cannot figure any motive for thus publishing the domestic misfortune of this poor Frenchman, but to afford the practical inference which we have already derived from it,-unless perhaps a general hint be also intended as to the inexpediency of botanists being unequally yoked' to unbotanical helpmates. The plates are among the best we have seen attached to any elementary book; and the explanations are distinct, and, as far as we have observed, accurate. There is very properly subjoined, 1. An index of remarkable plants, or those of which any particular mention is made in the body of the work; and, 2. An index to the explanations of technical terms. These, however, are both very short, and exclusively confined to the names of plants, or to technical terms. More than one half of the book, therefore, including the whole of the physiology, remains without any sort of index, which we regret the more, that the reader is not indulged even with a table of contents. We take notice of these little omissions the more pointedly, that they seem likely to become fashionable, and because the want of such aids is particularly felt in a book of consultation. In the course of the ample analysis which we have given, we have interspersed nearly all the observations which appeared to us of any importance. Some omissions struck us in the course of perusal. For instance, we met with no proper account of the Natural Orders of plants; no mention of the improvements sug gested by the late eminent Ventenat; nor so much as a distince ist of the orders proposed by Jussieu. This seems the more ex traordinary traordinary, considering the very high and well-merited tribute of praise bestowed on the last named botanist. The Genera Plantarum arranged in Natural Orders, Dr Smith says he looks upon as the most learned botanical work that has appeared since the Species Plantarum of Linnæus, and the most useful to those who study the philosophy of botanical arrangement;' and his admiration leads him to add of Jussieu, what we have been accustomed to hear only of Sir Isaac Newton, that a person may learn more from his doubts and queries, than from the assertions of most other writers.' The want of a distinct account of Gærtner's curious and interesting treatise De Fructibus,' is, we think, another defect. No account is given of what Linnæus termed the vernation of plants, that is, the different ways in which the rudiment of the leaf is folded up in the gem. A short abstract of Loefling's excellent essay on this subject in the Amoenitates, illustrated with a few figures, would have been acceptable to many botanical inquirers. The author is perhaps to blame also for not having given his advice as to the manner or order in which the student should prosecute the study of botany, especially as the arrangement of his book affords little aid in this respect. We do not recollect that the Doctor has any where inculcated the necessity of carefully studying the generic characters, and comparing them in living plants. In an elementary book, however, the learner might have been warned, that his real progress in botany must depend on his knowledge of genera; and that without this, his acquaintance with species, however extensive, can never entitle him to rank higher than as a nomenclaturist. Such a lesson seems the more seasonable, that the multiplication of periodical botanical publications has made it not unusual to learn botany by the easy method of turning over the coloured plates of such productions. We meet with a few instances of carelessness. How awkward does it seem to mention wheat as an instance of a biennial plant! (p. 103.) No doubt, the winter wheat (Triticum hybernum) is alluded to. But every farmer knows, that he may sow even this kind of wheat in spring, and reap it in the autumn of the same year, (a fact which seems to characterize it as an annual plant); though, by sowing in autumn, it may be made to show its blade during winter. It is rather remarkable, that the Doctor should also fall into an awkwardness about barley. The farinaceous matter of the cotyledons (he observes, p. 29.), acquires a sweet Laste as germination commences, evincing that it has undergone the same chemical change as in barley.' Barley must here be understood * English Botany; Botanical Magazine; Paradisus Londinensis; Botanist's Repository, are published monthly in London. derstood as synonymous with malt. This farinaceous matter, we may further observe, is, by a strange confusion of terms, denominated an important organ' of plants, (p. 291.) Through a similar confusion, we are told that the cabbage tribe is considered as antiscorbutic, and supposed to be of an alkalescent nature.' (p. 437.) We have been struck, too, with a few apparent contradictions. Thus, in one place, (p. 205.) the bad effects experienced from sitting under walnut-trees, are ascribed to the evolution of much carbonic acid gas; while, in another place, (p. 201.) we are told, these bad effects are probably to be attributed as much to poisonous secretions as to the air those trees evolve.' Inconsistencies of a minor sort here and there occur. The Latin terminations of some botanical terms are rigidly adhered to; while the Anglicised forms of others are adopted. Dr Smyth insists for involucrum, instead of involucre, proposed by Dr Martyn; while he yields to the Cambridge Professor in substituting the stiff English anther, in place of the elegant anthèra, for which he had formerly stickled. He declares, too, that Actinotus is a name not tenable in botany, because it has long been preoccupied in mineralogy,' (p. 373.); yet he makes no objections to a botanical Plumbago. Among the barbarous and uncouth generic names introduced into botany, the Ginkgo of Linnæus is denounced as intolerable;' and the Holmskioldia of Willdenow, asunutterable;' yet he submits with complacency to Krascheninikofia ! We do not much admire the general arrangement adopted by Dr Smith, although it may very possibly be original. From the analysis already given, our readers must have remarked, that he mixes, throughout, the descriptive with the physiological and chemical parts of his subject. After the description of the external shape of different sorts of leaves, for instance, the student is instantly hurried into a profound disquisition on their functions; although it can very seldom happen, that while the young botanist is anxious to know whether a leaf be toothed or serrated, pinnated or doubly pinnate, he should at the same time be concerned to learn its chemical action on the atmosphere. The physiology might commodiously stand by itself; including under this head, the organs of plants, as far as their uses are concerned; their spontaneous motions; their food; their means of propagation; and the examination of their constituent parts. This seems the more necessary that, notwithstanding the brilliant discoveries in modern chemistry, and the successful researches of some recent physiologists, particularly Darwin and Knight, this branch of the science is but yet in its infancy. Dr Smith's account of it is, however, very respectable, both for its fulness and accuracy. Upon Upon the whole, this Introduction to Botany seems to have been a hurried and a careless production. To us it appears not unlikely, that, in composing it, the Doctor has occasionally taken large portions of the manuscript of his lectures at the Royal Institution, and, dividing them into chapters, sent them, without more ado, to the press, as constituent parts of his book. While, therefore, it may be found a very useful assistant, it is not certainly that masterly botanical grammar which might have been expected from so eminent an author; nor calculated to supersede the elementary treatises of Willdenow, Rose, Hull, and others. One characteristic it certainly possesses in an eminent degreedelicacy. Those who are acquainted with the writings of Linnæus, know well how much they abound with coarse expressions and indelicate allusions. These are most scrupulously avoided by Dr Smith; and, we think, without any material detriment to the perspicuity of his descriptions. Botany is daily becoming a more fashionable female study; and this is an elementary book which may, be put with confidence into the hands of women, without any risk of wounding the most delicate mind. We are happy, for the sake of those fair students, to observe that Dr Smith promises a translation of his Flora Britannica; for this, we doubt not, will, when accomplished by Dr Smith himself, form the best popular herbal ever published. In the mean time, he very candidly recommends Dr Withering's Arrangement of British Plants; to which we would take the liberty to add Mr Galpine's Compend of British Botany (which is indeed nearly a translation of Dr Smith's Compendium Flora Britannica), as a most useful and commodious pocket companion in botanical excursions. ART. IX. Memoires de Physique et Chimie, de la Societé d'Arcueil. Tom. I. 8vo. Paris, 1807. THIS volume is the production of a little affociation, better calcu lated, we conceive, than the older establishments, for advancing the progrefs of phyfical fcience. The celebrated Berthollet, whofe labours have fo materially contributed to extend the practice and improve the theory of chemistry, anxious, amidst the poffeflion of eafe and competence, to promote, in his declining years, the objects of his earliest ambition, has gathered around him a few ingenious and active individuals, who affemble once a fortnight at his country refidence near Paris, and spend the day in philofophi cal |