210 



HARDVVICKE'S S ClfiN CE-GO S S IP. 



BOTANY. 



British Hepatice.— We have received the 

 second part of this splendid work by Dr. Carring- 

 ton, and are glad to note it is worthy its first 

 promise. There are four coloured plates to each 

 number of one edition, beautifully got up, and so 

 delicately tinted that the usual complaint of over 

 colouring cannot possibly be made in this case. 

 The work is intended to give descriptions and 

 iigures of the native species of J linger mannia, J\Iar- 

 chantia, aud Anthoceros, together with all their 

 known habitats. As it comes out in monthly 

 parts, coloured and uncoloured, it gives English 

 students the opportunity of adding an artistic and 

 valuable book to their library. 



SCIKPUS LACUSTRIS AND TRIQUETEK.— If "T.W." 



could see these two plants together, he would have 

 no difficulty in distinguishing them. (See Science- 

 Gossip for last June.) I have constantly seen the 

 Scirpus lacHstris in Switzerland ; it is five or six feet, 

 or even more, in water ; but I have never seen the 

 Scirpus triqueter (which is very abundant in shallow 

 water in the marsh at Villeneuve, at the head of the 

 Lake of Geneva) more than eighteen or twenty 

 inches high. The ste^m of S. lacustris is certainly 

 round, that of S. triqueter as certainly acutely three- 

 edged, as stated in my edition (1848) of Withing, 

 and not with blunt edges. Scirpus carinatus is 

 obtusely three-edged above the middle, and may 

 perhaps be the one referred to as quoted from Roth. 

 Some of tbe species of Scirpus bear so strong a 

 resemblance to each other that they can only be 

 determined by the form of the minute seeds ; for 

 instance, the Scirpus triqueter and Scirpus mucro- 

 natus, both growing together in the marsh at Ville- 

 neuve, have so much the same appearance ex- 

 ternally as to be undistinguishable except by the 

 seeds. Dr. Muret, ex-judge of Lausanne, an ardent 

 and indefatigable botanist, although often frequent- 

 ing the marsh, had always taken them for one and the 

 same species, viz. S. triqueter, till I drew his atten- 

 tion to the seeds, those of S. triqueter being smooth, 

 and those of S. mucrohutus being transversely 

 wrinkled; and M. Rapin, author of the "Flora of 

 Canton Vaud," at first took both for the same 

 plant, till I referred him to his own "Flora," when 

 he afterwaids told me he was satisfied they were 

 distinct; and though the S. triqueter is stated to 

 h&yejibrous roots and S. mucronatus running ones, 

 the characters are sometimes so indistinct as to lead 

 one to suppose they may have hybridized, growing 

 as they do close together. There is a Scirpus, con- 

 sidered by some as a variety of ^S*. lacustris, viz. 

 S. tabernoe montani, Gmell. (S. r/hiucus, Smith, Eng. 

 Bot.), a smaller and weaker plant with two stigmas, 

 the S. lacustris having three. Rapin says it is found 

 in places inundated during the winter ; Hooker says 



it has a glaucous colour, and that he "admits it as 

 a species with hesitation, the distinction only rest- 

 ing on artificial or microscopical characters." Rapin 

 says the seed is plan-convexe, while that of the S^ 

 lacustris, he says, is trigone. As the name of carina- 

 tus is sometimes, according to Bentham, given to a 

 variety of S. triqueter and sometimes to a variety of 

 S. lacustris, may not the S. carinatus be a hybrid 

 between the two? Gaudin ("Flora Helvetica") 

 says it is "culmo obsolete trigono, hinc planius- 

 culo, species triquetro et lacustri, illi majus habitu, 

 huic potissimum fructificatione affinis."— T. B. IF., 

 Brighton. 



The Pitcher-plant and its Prey.— Dr. Melli- 

 champ, of Bluffton, South Carolina, has been prose- 

 cuting researches on the pitchers of Sarracenia 

 variolaris and the way in which insects are caught 

 in them. The species abounds in this district, and 

 even early in May many pitchers were developed. 

 He has confirmed the presence of the sugary secre- 

 tion within the rim. He finds that it bedews the 

 throat all the way round the rim, and extends down- 

 wards from 1 inch to i inch. Dr. MelUchamp also 

 finds-and this is his most curious discovery— that 

 this sweet secretion is continued externally in a 

 line along the edge of the wing of the pitchers down 

 to the petiole or to the ground, forming a honeyed 

 trail or pathway up which some insects, aud espe- 

 cially ants, travel to the more copious feeding- 

 ground above; whence they are precipitated into the 

 well beneath. Ants are largely accumulated in 

 these pitchers. As to the supposed intoxicaiing 

 qualities of this secretion. Dr. MelUchamp was 

 unable to find any evidence of it. On cuttiiig off 

 the summit of the pitchers and exposing them freely 

 to flies in his house, he found that the insects which 

 came to them, and fed upon ihe sweet matter with 

 avidity, flew away after sipping their fill, to all ap- 

 pearance unharmed. On the other hand, he thinks 

 that the watery liquid in which the insects are 

 drowned and macerated possesses ansesthetic pro- 

 perties ; that house-flies, after brief immersion in it, 

 and when permitted to walk about in a thin layer of 

 it, " were invariably killed— as at first supposed— or 

 at any rate stupefied or paralyzed, in from half a 

 minute to three or five minutes," but most of them 



would revive very gradually in the course of an hour 

 or so. 



The Potato Disease in Kent.— Watching in 

 North Kent the rise, progress, and consummation 

 of this foe to the farmer during the past autumn, I 

 am convinced that fields lying low, and badly 

 drained, are most apt to be affected, other things 

 being equal The infatuation with which many 

 men are possessed, leads them to neglect pre- 

 cautions they might take, which would rescue part 

 of the crop, especially a speedy digging and careful 



