The Physiology of Plants

Abstract

IT has already been pointed out in the columns of NATURE that our botanical schools in England are at present leading in great measure a parasitic existence on those of Germany in respect of the text-books which are in common use: translations of the works of Prantl, Sachs, and De Bary are in the hands of most of our students, while the number of manuals from foreign sources will shortly be increased by the publication of others which are in active preparation. However greatly we may admire the works of the above authors, still it is with no small satisfaction that we turn from them to the review of a book which we may well regard as the first-fruits of a renaissance in this country of the physiological branch of the science of botany; and the more so as the production of original text-books may be taken as one important indication of activity in the pursuit of the subject to which they relate. But while receiving this work of Dr. Vines with a hearty welcome, it is to be regretted that, as noticed in the preface, a considerable interval of time has unavoidably elapsed between the printing of the first sheets and the completion of the book: thus one great advantage of original production as opposed to translation, viz. that of being more nearly up to date, is in some measure lost in the present case, and it is to be hoped that the book will, as it well deserves, quickly run on to a second edition in which this defect may be remedied.

Lectures on the Physiology of Plants.

By S. H. Vines (Cambridge University Press, 1886.)