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NEW PUBLICATIONS. 245
Die Lemnacoen. Eine monograpJdsche Untermclmmj . Von
Dr.
Friederich Hegelmaier. (J'he Lemnacea; a Monograph. By Dr.
F. Hegelmaier.) 4to. With 16 plates. 170 pp. Leipzig: Wil-
helra Engelraann. 1868.
This monograph has long been looked for, and is a most creditable
performance, Dr. Hegelmaier having spared no pains to make it per-
fect in every way his means and resources would admit. His atten-
tion was first directed to the Order by the Lemnaceee collected in tro-
pical Africa by that indefatigable and zealous collector, Dr. Welwitsch,
being entrusted to him for critical examination. The result of this
examination was published in this Journal, and not only prompted
Dr. Hegelmaier to pursue the subject further until he had exhausted
it as far as his present materials would allow, but also induced others
to follow his meritorious example, and to confide the result of then-
labours to our care for publication. The history of this monograph
is an apt illustration bow British and foreign botany act and react
upon each other. Some of our local botanists probably did not thank
us when we filled up a whole plate and a considerable number of pages
of our Journal with dry technicalities about African Lcmnaceae, and
yet to the publication of these they owe indirectly the discovery of a
genus of Phanerogams absolutely new to the British Flora,— we mean
Wolffia.
Dr. Hegelmaier rejects the opinion of those who incorporate the
Lemnaceee with the Pistiacere (which is undoubtedly a group of Aroi-
dece, closely connected with the rest of the Order through the genus
Ainhrosinia), and finds a better systematic position for them near
Zostei'acece, which must either be altogether united with the Najadece,
or be placed in their immediate vicinity. The Lemnaceee represent tiie
lowest type of flowering plants, Lemna Columbiana, Karst., being the
most sivaipile, Spirodela poIp'rMza, Schleid., the most complex organism
of the group.
Dr. Hegelmaier enters into full details about the anatomical struc-
ture and morphology of the Lemnaceee, illustrating his views and
observations by carefully-drawn plates, and concludes with a syste-
matic enumeration of all known genera, species, and varieties of this
ill-understood Order of plants. Altogether Dr. Hegelmaier enumerates
3 genera and 21 species, viz. :—