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HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



library, but could find no notice of it. Some of the 

 plants were sixteen or eighteen inches high : it was in 

 appearance not unlike a very large M. moschatits, 

 with downy leaves and stems and upright growth. 

 If I mention the place in which it grows it will 

 probably be exterminated by this time next year, so I 

 shall privately communicate with Mr. Marquand, 

 who will, I hope, favour us with an accurate descrip- 

 tion of it. — JVorris F. Davey, Abergavenny. 



Marine Hunting-ground. — May I venture to 

 call the attention of readers to an excellent hunting- 

 ground for seaweeds, viz. Peveral Point, at Swanage. 

 I have not seen it mentioned in any of the works on 

 seaweed which I have come across, and it may 

 therefore be new to some collectors. — A. H. B. 



Lemna Minor. — I observed to-day Lemna minor 

 in flower ; it was growing in a small pond mixed 

 with barren fronds of L. trisuka, the plants were 

 floating, the pond being nearly full. With the 

 naked eye I distinguished the stamens perfectly, one 

 plant had two, and I think I have seen the style. 

 I have not time at present to examine the plant 

 thoroughly. — M. S. Pope, Maidstone. 



GEOLOGY, &c. 



Ichthyosaurus at Watchet. — With reference 

 to Mr. T. Stock's interesting note on the discovery of 

 Ichthyosaurus in the Lower Lias, near Watchet, it 

 may be remarked that there is a fine example of the 

 pectoral arch from that formation and locality in the 

 museum of Boulogne-sur-Mer. The specimen is 

 described by Dr. H. E. Sauvage, without specific 

 name, in the Bulletin of the French Geological 

 Society, ser. 3, vol. xv. (1887), p. 726, pi. xxvi. — 

 A. S. W. 



Dryopithecus. — Until lately it has been con- 

 sidered that Dryopithecus was more nearly allied to 

 the human species than any ape now living. The 

 reason for this supposition was that the best specimen 

 known was very imperfect, and showed but a small sym- 

 physis. However, Professor A. Gaudry has recently 

 shown from a more perfect specimen of the lower 

 jaw, showing a long symphysis, that Dryopithecus is 

 really the most generalised of all the anthropoid 

 apes. 



The Teignmouth Pebbles. — Our conglomerate 

 rocks and pebbles are full of corals, spongy forms, and 

 various mineral rocks. Whence do they come ? — 

 Visitors who wander season after season on the lovely 

 shores of Teignmouth and Shaldon, collecting pebbles, 

 often wonder whence they come. Having read much 

 with a view to the solution of the enigma and still 

 pursuing the subject, I have arrived at some reason- 

 able and satisfactory theory respecting the source 

 whence came these attractive productions of nature. 



The Teignmouth pebbles for nearly a century have 

 lent adornments to many a fair lady of the Isle 

 of Great Britain. Visitors who ramble along our 

 shores to the Parson and Clerk Rocks, and again 

 around the Ness Rocks, on the Shaldon side by 

 crossing in the ferry-boat at the mouth of the 

 " Teign," will still find the very peculiar red 

 conglomerate rocks, and around Teignmouth, just 

 a few miles apart, those rich quarries of marble and 

 madrepore corals. In looking at those rocks and 

 quarries, I have felt convinced that some wonderful 

 convulsion must have taken place here in the remote 

 ages. The observer will notice that the rocks have 

 the appearance of being lifted up, shattered and 

 overturned in some places, but it is only the geologist 

 who knows the vast extent of this disturbance. He 

 never finds crystalline, non-fossiliferous rocks which 

 have not been more or less removed from their 

 original position, and usually he finds them to have 

 been thrown up by some powerful agency into almost 

 every possible position. Those wonderful convulsions 

 of nature have brought to light the useful metals, coal, 

 rock-salt, marble, gypsum, and other useful minerals, 

 and when we consider how necessary these substances 

 are to civilised society, who will doubt that it was a 

 striking act of benevolence which thus introduced 

 disturbance, dislocation, and apparent ruin into the 

 earth's crust. Most of the sublime and the beautiful 

 in the scenery of a country depends upon this dis- 

 turbing agency. Beautiful as vegetable nature is, 

 how tame is a landscape, where only a dead level is 

 covered with it and no swelling hills or jutting rock, 

 or murmuring waters to relieve the monotonous 

 scene ; and how does this interest increase with the 

 wildness and ruggedness of the surface, and reach its 

 maximum only where the disturbance and dislocation 

 have been most violent. Surely natural scenery does 

 afford to the unsophisticated soul one of the richest 

 enjoyments to be found on earth. — A. J. R. Sclater, 

 M. C. S. , Teign month . 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



Monstrous Foxgloves. — Observing a number 

 of stems of the foxglove growing too closely, from 

 seed which must have been lying in the ground 

 several years, I thinned them out to two, which were 

 then very near together. When about two feet high 

 each stem bore a flower at its apex, which, when 

 fully developed, was bell-shaped, three inches in 

 diameter, and opening vertically upwards. Each 

 corolla was eighteen lobed, and enclosed twenty 

 stamens, or, to be quite correct, one of them had 

 nineteen stamens and one small petal. There were 

 the usual markings, but in place of the pistil there 

 appeared a number of green buds. By this time, 

 however, the lower portions of the stems began to 

 flower in the orthodox fashion, and the abnormal 

 flowers gradually faded. I may add that each stem 

 produced a number of branches, nearly all of which 

 developed first a large flower at the apex, opening 

 like the first, vertically upwards, catching the drops 



