™ ur 
PRIMULA ELATICR IN BRITAIN. 195 
pale colour and are generally more like those of the Primrose 
than those of the Oxlip. The other, and far less common, 
form much more closely approaches the pure Oxlip, having often 
the characteristic shape of the umbel, while the individual 
flowers are mainly of the Oxlip character, but much larger than 
usual, sometimes even approaching those of the Primrose in size. 
Kerner has called attention * to the occurrence of this hybrid 
(which he calls Primula digenea) on the Continent, where, it 
seems, it is not rare. He says:—“I have specimens from 
Montreux (Vaud); from Le Mont, near Lausanne, in Switzer- 
land; from Thauer, near Hall, in the Tyrol; from Fusse des 
Kesselberges, near Lake Kochel, in the Bavarian Alps; from 
Gamming, in the Erlafthale ; and from Purkersdorf, in the Forest 
of Vienna, in Lower Austria." Many other Continental writers 
alude to the oceurrence of this hybrid. The P. intricata and 
P. Thomasinii of Grenier & Godron t are, I believe, both synonyms 
for it, instead of for P. acaulis x veris, which I believe to be their 
P. variabilis. The first writer to call attention to the occurrence 
of this hybrid in Britain was the late G. S. Gibson, of Saffron 
Walden f. 
The occurrence of an abundance of hybrids between the Prim- 
tose and the Oxlip may, I think, be found to throw some light 
on the strangely-restricted distribution of the latter in Britain. 
The Oxlip is, alinost certainly, not extending its boundaries in 
thia country. It seldom, if ever, extends to new plantations, 
‘ven in the heart of its Area. I may cite the case of an oak- 
Plantation in Suffolk, sixty-nine years old, to which the plant 
has hot extended, though it is abundant in woods within a mile 
" almost (if not quite) every direction $. There can, of course, 
miri be a doubt that the Oxlip-Area has, in the past, been 
hee! restricted, artificially, by the removal of woodland ; but 
ppears reason to think that it has been, and is still being, 
. Vestern, bot. Zeitsch. 1875, p. 79. 
ore de France,’ vol. ii. (1850), p. 449. 
* ‘Phytologist, vol, i (1844), p. 996. 
nated to Windsor Wood, Little Saxham, the acorns for which were 
oak woods an inscribed stone in the wood records) in 1828 and 1829. l Many 
the suppl in the Eastern Counties were planted or replanted about this time, 
PP'y of large oak timber suitable for shipbuilding having become greatly 
red : i 
l teed owing to the heavy demand for such timber for the navy during the 
ong French war, 
