Booknews
The first publication of 170 letters written by the Abb<'e> Dominique Chaiz to Dr. Dominique Villars between 1772 and 1799. The two were collaborating on the publication of the first flora for the old province of Dauphin<'e>. Their letters reveal the uncertainties of plant classification in the later 18th century as well as the penetration of the Enlightenment into a remote region of France, the enthusiasms, anxieties, and perils of rural clerical life during the French Revolution, and (occasionally) evidence about the deforestation of the mountains. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.