198 WILD FLOWEBS OF 



by a path through the woods towards Staunton ; and 

 P. calcareum, a still more local species, I haye ob- 

 served just within the wood on the side of the path 

 by the Wye between Symond's Tat and New Wier, 

 as well as abundantly among the rocks at Lydbrook. 

 The Scaly Spleenwort (Ceteracli officinarwri), is here 

 most abundant, it covers the old walls of millstone 

 grit about "Whitchurch, and between that village and 

 the Wye, occurs on Welch Bicknor church and walls, 

 on rocks near Clearwell, and most profusely on the 

 walls at Chepstow. Not far hence is the sweetly 

 retired village of Clearwell, situated within the pre- 

 cincts of the Forest of Dean, with a broken stone 

 cross in its quiet street of old cottages. Most of these 

 are overgrown with pretty wreaths of the scented 

 Aspleniwn or Maiden-hair ; and at a singular mossy 

 excavation at the entrance of the place, called the 

 Pleasure Bocks, the finest fronds of Hart's-tongu 

 (Scolopendrum vulgar e) and Aspidium angular e luxu- 

 riate that I ever met with. Some that I gathered 

 here were nearly a yard in length. 



The scene is changed ! for full in our view, lo, the 

 eternal billows of the ever restless ocean lash the 

 sandy beach in their magnificence of foam and spray. 

 Yet even here is vegetable life, for, wide as the winds 

 spread the sandy inundation from the sea margin, still 

 Flora makes an effort for the resumption of her domi- 

 nion, and disputes every inch of ground. Though 

 reduced to a pigmy, yet the Burnet Hose blooms most 

 profusely; the Yellow Poppy ( Glaucimi luteum) shows 

 its curious glaucous leaves and specious opening 

 corolla; the Sea Milk-wort (Glauoc maritima), the Sea- 

 side Sandwort (Arenaria peploides), the Sea Convol- 



