to y Dr. Sm i T H \f botanical Hiftory 



mentions M. exigua as an Englifti plant, adding a new edition of 

 Lobel's lynonym from Parkinfon, and copying the Synopjls for its 

 place of growth. Whether he had afterwards found any variety 

 of M. Pulegium which he took for the mint in queftion ; whether 

 his fcruples arofe from neither himfelf nor his friends having ever 

 been able to detect M. ex/gua at all ; or whether, which is moft 

 probable, the appearance and fmell of the fpecimens in Sir J. Banks's 

 herbarium decided his opinion, he inferted M. ex/gua in his fecond 

 edition, 1778, as the very lame plant with M. Pulegium ; for, not 

 having marked it with a greek /3, it feems he did not even think it 

 a variety. 



^uch was the ftate of the cafe when the Linnean Herbarium ar- 

 rived among us. It was often confulted on this fubje£t ; and at' 

 length, in order to throw all the light upon it in my power, I pub- 

 lilhed as exact a figure as I could delineate from one of the fpe- 

 cimens, in my Plantarum Icones haclenus ineditce^ tab. 38, taking the 

 liberty to (hike out all the fynonyms except Ray (I ought rather to 

 have faid Dillenius), and expreffing my doubts of even that. I 

 mentioned a hint of Mr. Hudfon's, that the original fpecimens 

 might have been brought from Scotland byHoufton. But this con- 

 jecture, as will hereafter appear, is totally groundlefs. 



Since the -above publication I have been fo fortunate as to ac- 

 quire what appears, almoir. beyond a doubt, the real plant of Dil- 

 lenius. Sir Jofeph Banks, not folicitous to encumber his herbarium 

 ■with doubtful fpecimens, very obligingly preiented me with a num- 

 ber of unfettled mints from Miller's collection. Among them is one 

 with the following infeription in Buddie's hand-writing: 



u Mentha verticillata minima odore fragrantiflimo. Buddie. 

 u Floies huic minutirTmii multi in unicum communem pedicu- 



"lum 



