186 



SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



[August 1, 1866. 



BOTANY. 



Drying Plants.— Twenty years ago, when botany 

 was my hobby, I adopted a plan for drying my 

 specimens, which was both rapid and very effectual 

 in preserving colours. I borrowed a tin dripping- 

 pan from the cook, which was just the size of my 

 sheets of blotting-paper. In this I laid the produce 

 of the day's excursion between sheets of blotting- 

 paper in the usual way, and when the pile was 

 complete I covered it over with a layer of common 

 scouring sand half an inch thick, so that the tin 

 dish appeared to be simply full of sand. I then 

 placed it on the kitchen fender, or on the hob, 

 or in the oven if it were not too hot, and in three 

 or four hours the whole batch of specimens was 

 perfectly dried. It required a little care to take 

 them out at the right moment, when they were 

 baked just enough, and not too much ; but this 

 care being given, the success of the plan was perfect. 

 Many specimens still in my herbarium bear witness 

 to the superiority of such rapid drying over the old 

 method. — F. T. M., Loughborough. 



Mortality among Beech Trees.— Last summer 

 a number of beech trees in this neighbourhood were 

 struck with sudden death. They put out their 

 leaves in the spring, as usual, but towards the end 

 of the summer the leaves were all brown and the 

 trees dead. They have since been cut down. These 

 were trees of thirty or forty years' growth, standing 

 upon low ground with a subsoil of gravel. I have 

 just observed a row of a dozen similar trees on 

 rather higher ground, apparently going off in the 

 same manner ; but there are plenty of beeches on 

 the neighbouring hills, where the subsoil is slate 

 rock, which remain in perfect health. Can any of 

 your correspondents explain this phenomenon? 

 Do beech trees object to a gravelly subsoil ? If so, 

 why did they not show their antipathy earlier, as 

 the roots must have reached it long ago, the surface 

 soil being, only two or three feet deep ? — F. T. M., 

 Loughborough. 



Eritillaria Meleagris. — Two of your readers 

 are surprised to find the Fritillaria Meleagris men- 

 tioned as a rare plant, and even doubted as a British 

 native by a correspondent in your June number. 

 It has been found by me growing abundantly on 

 an island in the Tame, near Tamworth, Stafford- 

 shire, and by a friend in still greater profusion in 

 the damp meadows at Oxford, on the banks of the 

 Isis .— A. 31. D. 



Mistletoe of the Oak. — A correspondent (N.) 

 is under the impression that he has certainly seen a 

 specimen of the true Viscum album which was para- 

 sitic on the oak. The question is still open, — Does 

 Loranthus occur in Britain ? It has never been 

 recorded. 



Eritillaria Meleagris grows in great profu- 

 sion about a mile from Oxford, covering several 

 fields on the Berkshire bank of the river, between 

 Oxford and Iffley. The white variety is not un- 

 common. I have also found it near Godstone, and 

 it occurs also on the chalk hills near Wrotham, in 

 Kent. Its profusion near Oxford is remarkable. 

 Its period of flowering is from about May 20th or 

 25th (according to the season) to the middle of 

 June.— Douglas C. Timmins, M.A., Oriel College, 

 Ox on. 



Yellow Star of Bethlehem (Ornithogalum 

 luteum'). — The notice of a locality for the Spiked 

 Star of Bethlehem (0 . Pyrenaicum) in the May 

 number of this Journal suggests the placing on 

 record of one for 0. luteum, which is also said to be 

 rare. I found two plants of it only, on the 20th 

 of April last, by a mountain stream near Ambleside, 

 having never previously seen it. — E. Green, Gras- 

 mere. 



Drying Elowers by Heat.— I have adopted 

 this plan for some years, on the recommendation of 

 a friend. With some plants it acts very well, but 

 not with others. Much depends on the mode of 

 doing it. It should be done gradually, and with an 

 iron not too hot. My friend told me that he had 

 taken nearly two hours in thus drying a plant, but 

 he found himself well rewarded. I have Orchis 

 fusca now that I ironed out in 1863, and it has lost 

 very little of its colour. Ophrys muscifera looks 

 well ironed; so do grasses. — Henry Ullyett, High 

 Wycombe. 



The Daisy. — The Erench name this flower Mar- 

 guerite, as well as Paquerette. Thence St. Louis 

 took for a device on his ring a daisy and a lily, in 

 allusion to the name of the Queen, his wife, and to 

 the arms of Erance ; to which he added a sapphire, 

 on which a crucifix was engraved, surrounded with 

 this motto : — " Hors cet annuel, pourrions-nous 

 trouver amour <"' because, as this prince said, it was 

 the emblem of all he held most dear — religion, 

 Erance, and his spouse. Lady Margaret, Countess 

 of Richmond, bore three white daisies (Marguerites) 

 on a green turf. 



The Crocus.— Eabulous history derives the name 

 of this flower from a beautiful youth named Crocus, 

 who was consumed by the ardency of his love for 

 Smilax, and afterwards metamorphosed into the 

 plant which still bears his name. Others suppose it 

 to be taken from Coriscus, a city and mountain of 

 Cilicia. It is one of the flowers of which Homer 

 {Iliad, book 4) has composed the genial couch of 

 Jove and Juno. 



" And sudden Hyacinths the turf bestrow, 

 And flow'ry Crocus made the mountain glow." 



Flora Hisiorica. 



