AS AX AGENT IN PLANT DISPKRSAL. 335 



t 



is to tow the net along in the eddies where the drift abounds ; 

 and this is often best done from the bank, or where the drift is 

 massed together in quantity it may be ladled indiscriminately 

 into the net. The tedious labour of picking out the seeds and 

 seed-vessels, &c, from the rubbish has to be performed at home ; 

 out the seeds and seed-vessels are by no means the only things 

 °°k tor. Many an unimportant-looking piece of a stem or 

 branch, if it is provided with a node, will reproduce the plant, 

 though it may be only half an inch in length. In this manner I 

 have raised plants of Scutellaria galericulata, Nasturtium sp., 

 from what seemed mere bits of floating rubbish, but which were 

 really small fragments of their stems or branches. Then, again, 

 the shoots of Myosotis palustris and other plants are present in 

 numbers, with several of the shoots and buds of the Potamogetons 

 and of Sagittaria sagittifolia. But there will be found much that 

 is not botanical amongst the rubbish. The entomologist, parti- 

 cularly, will be interested in the large number of grub-cases 

 that float about in our rivers all the year, and there will be found 

 numerous other minute forms of life which are beyond the 

 subject of this inquiry. 



In my ignorance of a large number of the seeds and fruits, of 

 the bits of stem, of the buds, and of the leaves, which in one 

 case at least are able to reproduce the individual, I had to raise 

 the plant. This served the double purpose of establishing the 

 germinating power, or the reproductiveness, or at least the 

 vitality of the seed, seed-vessel, portion of stem or branch, bud, 

 shoot, or leaf, as the case might be, and of identifying the plant. 

 But even after, with much labour, one has sorted out the collec- 

 tions, and the seed-vessels and seeds have been placed in saucers 

 of water covered over, where they will ultimately germinate, the 

 large basin of rubbish should be left to stand. It will convey 

 much information, as the spring advances, of the somewhat 

 mysterious winter history of the Lemnce and other small plants 

 that thrive on its surface. In fact, the whole method of inquiry 

 is well suited to throw light on the winter history of many of 

 the less familiar water-plants. 



My observations on these rivers are not yet complete, but I 

 may say that collections obtained from the drift of the Thames 

 and the Lea have much the same composition, the differences 

 between them being few. The seeds and seed-vessels first begin 

 to accumulate in any quantity in October, and on through the 



