Robert Brown of London, is endeavouring to group the natural orders of plants into natural classes, or rather into larger natural orders, with determinate characters: he has communicated some parts of his labour to the botanists of Paris. He has been the first to employ as a new character in the distinction of natural orders, the estivation of flowers, or the manner in which they are folded in the buds.
C. S. Rafinesque, in his Analysis of Nature, has adopted a new practice, that of giving single substantive Latin names to the natural orders and families of plants.
Mirbel has proposed a new nomenclature of fruits in his Elements of Botany.
Decandolle, after publishing the principles of the science in his Theory of Botany, has begun to undertake a general species plantarum, according to the natural classification.
Three splendid Floras of the south of Europe have been undertaken. 1. Flora Græca, by Sibthorp and Smith in England. 2. Flora Lusitanica, by Link and Hoffmansegg in Germany. 3. Flora Nepolitana, by Tenore in Naples. They are very expensive works, and are not yet terminated. Received in January, 1819.
5. Staurotide.
Extract of a letter to the Editor, from John Torrey, M.D., of New-York.
"Mr. Pierce and myself lately found staurotide on the island of New-York. It occurs in considerable quantity in a rock of mica slate, on the banks of the Hudson, about three and a half miles from the city. The crystals very seldom form the perfect cross, though many were found, intersecting each other imperfectly at angles of 60°. Several single crystals were obtained exceedingly perfect. They were short 4-sided prisms, with the acute lateral edges truncated at each extremity on the two solid angles of the most obtuse lateral edges, forming diedral terminations at each extremity of the prism. The faces of these terminations were inclined to each other at an angle of 67° and a few minutes. The annexed figure shows the form of the crystal."
6. Supplement to the "Remarks on the Geology and Mineralogy of a Section of Massachusetts, on Connecticut River, &c." contained in No. 2, Art. I, of this Journal, by E. Hitchcock, A. M.