178 Rhodora [OCTOBER 
she has not been on the island for five years, these little plants may be 
older than we think; we cannot set up as judges of the age of plants 
which we in this country have never had a chance of studying. It 
would be absurd to suppose they were natives of the soil and had 
shown themselves only in these late years. When I saw these pretty 
little things so stout and healthy amongst the grass, I felt that the 
Scotch ling had settled there to stay; it thrives in our climate, and 
in time the slope may be covered with it, at the right season all aglow 
with its rosy flowers. 
In August of this year I heard of two Callunas discovered in a new 
locality by Dr. E. Le Roy Thomson of New Haven, Ct., and under 
his guidance I went to see them. They are a few feet apart on the 
open common, growing amongst the usual vegetation of the locality; 
the largest spreads from one root about three feet six inches by two 
feet nine, the other, nearly circular, is about three feet in diameter. 
Dr. ‘Thomson first observed them in July, 1906, while on one of his 
frequent rides over the island and has seen them every year since; 
from their rate of growth, which is more rapid than that of the Coffin 
plants, he judges that they may be from eight to ten years old. ‘They 
are miles away from any human habitation as well as from the nursery; 
it seems improbable that they can have sprung from wind-wafted 
seed of the Henry Coffin plants, but are more likely to be of the Star- 
buck, Kimball or Dahlgren sowing, and this will be the most plausi- 
ble explanation for the appearance of any that may be discovered 
hereafter on the island. 
In September of this year Dr. Thomson found still another Calluna 
on the open common, but far from the two just mentioned as well 
as from the nursery. ‘This is a large plant, about three feet in diam- 
eter. 
The cross-leaved heather, E. tetralix, has diminished sadly in num- 
bers since 1887 when Miss Coffin found some twenty-five plants, 
more than twice as many as in 1884. It is very attractive with its 
head of delicate pink blossoms, and by the reckless picking of some 
of its admirers it is too often pulled out of the ground, so that it has 
been reduced in number to five individuals. ‘This is in the locality 
by which the road passes, but in the ten acres or more of the Coffin 
and Emerson nurseries Dr. Thomson has discovered other specimens, 
eight measuring each from twelve to twenty inches in diameter and 
eleven small ones. By means of these hidden away in places diffi- 
cult of access the species may keep its existence. | 
