HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



1S3 



ANOTHER AFTERNOON OF CONCHOLO- 

 GICAL WORK IN NORTH STAFFORD- 

 SHIRE, WITH SOME BOTANICAL NOTES. 



SO many of my conchological friends have kindly 

 expressed to me the interest they derived from 

 reading a short article which appeared in the 

 February number of Science-Gossip on this subject, 

 that I am tempted to send a few notes on a second 

 little expedition in search of land-shells. It was on 

 Saturday the 8th February last, a fine, bright, sunny 

 afternoon, that I and my friend Mr. T. F. Burrows, 

 sallied forth again, with the intention of paying 

 another visit to our old Helix fusca ground ; 

 but on arriving about three miles on our way I 

 suggested that we should vary our route by turning 

 up a bye-path through a favourite rocky dell, and 

 perhaps one of the prettiest bits of scenery in the 

 valley of the Churnet, in order to gather a few 

 flowers of that rare plant Petasites albus, which I 

 knew grew in this charming dell. Accordingly, we 

 took the turn, and soon came across the flowers, 

 beautiful in their white masses, on the banks of the 

 little meandering stream, and also peeping out of the 

 nooks and crannies of the rocks, where, doubtless, the 

 seeds had been washed in flood-time. This plant 

 was, I believe, noticed first in this locality about 

 a year ago, by my botanical friend, Mr. E. D. 

 Bostock, who at once pronounced it to be P. albus, 

 and a good find we knew it to be, as Sowerby, in the 

 latest edition of his "English Botany," states that 

 this plant is only found wild in a few places in 

 Yorkshire and Scotland. This year the first flowers 

 were found in January, and specimens were sent to 

 several of our leading botanists at Kew and elsewhere, 

 to make sure of its identity, as the leaves, which afford 

 the simplest means of distinction, had not yet appeared. 

 Doctors are sometimes said to disagree, I believe, 

 and so in this case there was at first a considerable 

 difference of opinion as to whether our specimens 

 were the true P. albus. Now, however, all the 

 authorities consulted have come to one harmonious 

 conclusion, and agree that my friend who first 

 discovered the plant on this spot was quite right in 

 pronouncing it to be P. albus. Such a wild flower 

 as this, flowering as it does alone and almost in the 

 depth of winter, braving the frosts and snow without 

 any apparent injury, and enlivening the general 

 wintry outlook, is one to be valued indeed. We 

 shall do our utmost to protect it from those so-called 

 botanists who seem to take a delight in clearing 

 away many of our rarer wild plants and ferns, and in 

 attempting, as Mr. Shirley Hibberd said of some 

 vandal tourists in the Lake District a few years ago, 

 if possible, "to peel the planet." In this same spot 

 to which I have referred, it may be interesting to 

 botanists to hear that we find the handsome heart- 

 leaved valerian ( Valeriana Pyrenaica), sweet Cicely, 

 (Myrrhis odorata), and several of the orchids ; and 



not far off we meet with the moonwort [Botrychium 

 lunar ia), Lathnea squamaria, and many other 

 botanical treasures which it always cheers a botanist 

 to find flourishing in their native haunts. Having 

 gathered two or three spikes of P. albus for botanical 

 friends, we proceeded on our walk up this delightful 

 dale, and having mourned over the giant of the 

 valley, a splendid specimen of the larch, now laid 

 prostrate, alas ! by the woodman's axe, our conversa- 

 tion naturally turned to conchology ; and on my 

 reminding my companion that we were on the spot 

 where the only Staffordshire specimens of Helix 

 lamellata of which we had ever heard were found, 

 he replied that he was quite tired of searching for 

 this shell in this locality ; and as a fact both he and 

 I and others had spent many hours, not to say whole 

 afternoons, in this fruitless search. " That is just the 

 sort of spot, amongst those beech leaves, to find 

 Lamellata," I remarked; whereupon my friend seized 

 a handful of the leaves, and, curiously enough, one of 

 the very molluscs appeared to our view ! We could 

 scarcely at first believe our eyes, but there sure 

 enough it was ; and on careful examination no doubt 

 remained that we had at last found our long-searched- 

 for H. lamellata. It is a northern shell, and Rimmer 

 gives Yorkshire, Scotland, and North Wales as the 

 localities where it has been found ; and now we may 

 add North Staffordshire to the list, and I think this 

 will probably be found to be its southern limit. This 

 find brings our North Staffordshire list of species of 

 land and freshwater Mollusca up to ninety-six : 

 not a bad number, I think, for only half an English 

 county. On further search we were only able to 

 find three more specimens, and evening drawing on, 

 we reluctantly had to leave, and I need scarcely say 

 we never reached our H fusca ground at all that 

 day. Besides H. lamellata we found many Zonites, 

 and a few other common Molluscs ; but in how much 

 of interest to a naturalist, and especially to a 

 microscopist, does such a long search amongst the 

 fallen and decaying leaves result ! The specimens 

 of minute larva?, beetles, spiders, and insects of all 

 kinds that one comes across are almost innumerable. 

 Amongst these perhaps the most interesting which we 

 came across were the Chelifers, belonging to the 

 genus Arachnids and the family called Pseudo- 

 scorpions. These creatures have oval bodies, and 

 the palpi are elongated, and strongly resemble the 

 claws of the true scorpion ; in fact, they are just like 

 small scorpions without tails, and furnish most 

 interesting objects for the microscope under a low 

 power. 



But I am afraid I have already been tempted to 

 gossip too long, and I must conclude by saying, that 

 although the results of this little natural history ramble 

 were not altogether so fruitful as those of our last, yet 

 perhaps to us they were more valuable, as we had at 

 last discovered (or rather rediscovered) H. lamellata, 

 for Garner in his "Natural History of Staffordshire" 



