ON HIEROCHLOA BOREALIS AS A SCOTTISH SPECIES 233 



Johnson states : " It has since been met with in two or three 

 other places in Scotland." I have failed to find on what 

 authority this is based ; and Miss Charlotte Gower, \vho 

 probably could have given some explanation, I do not know 

 where to address, if living ? 



The plant had now become a recognised Scottish species, 

 and was gathered by Mr. Backhouse, among many others. 



For some time before 1880 it had disappeared, or was 

 not found, and on i6th December 1880 Mr. J. Grant wrote : 

 " No one has found the Holy Grass since Dick's time. Thurso 

 river has been searched for [it] again and again, but without 

 success." 



In some ' Caithness Botanical Notes ' in the " Northern 

 Ensign," 3 ist January, 1884, Mr. J. Grant remarks : " Of the 

 causes here mentioned (of the disappearance of plants), none 

 will probably account for the disappearance of the Holy 

 Grass from the banks of the Thurso River ; and as the 

 reasons for its removal may perchance never be known, we 

 can but designate that mysterious cause the loth." 



In 1885, in 'Botanical Notes of a Tour in Caithness 

 and Sutherland, July 1885,' in the "Journal of Botany," 

 P- 333> Messrs. Fox and Hanbury write : " An evening stroll 

 along the banks of the Thurso River did not yield us the 

 HierocJiloe, which grows almost opposite the spot where the 

 Caithness Naturalist lies buried. The plant is at all times 

 difficult to be found, and has probably suffered at the hands 

 of collectors ; its season, too, was long passed. A single head, 

 however, was gathered about three weeks before our arrival 

 by Mr. A. H. Bremner of Thurso, which he kindly gave us." 



On the nth of June 1888 Mr. J. Grant wrote: "You 

 will be interested to hear that I came on the Holy Grass at 

 last. It was growing below the Cemetery where Dick is 

 buried, and not above it, as Smiles makes out. There were 

 only a few heads, so I did not take any. There is just one 

 left at the place mentioned by Smiles ; but Mr. Lindsay 

 informs me there are at least 500 heads of HierocJiloe on a 

 moist bank several miles up the river." 



On the 7th of July this year Mr. Lindsay writes : " The 

 Northern Holy Grass is spreading on the banks of the 

 Thurso River. I have pulled specimens within a hundred 



