174 



HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



delightful day could not have been chosen ; not only 

 was it fine throughout, but its warmth was tempered 

 by a pleasant breeze. Proceeding by rail to Liss, 

 we had a nice drive of about five miles, through a 

 beautiful country " in nature's greenest livery drest," 

 by several hop-gardens, where the bines were trailing 

 towards the tops of the poles. As we passed through 

 the long straggling village, we saw the picturesque 

 old house in which the great naturalist spent his 

 tranquil years. We first walked round the grounds 

 of the rectory — charmingly situated, and noted for 

 several rare and well-grown pines ; the church was 

 next visited, with its plain tablet to White, who is 

 simply designated as " the historian of Selborne," 

 and saw his grave, marked by a little headstone 

 bearing his initials and the date 1793. We measured 

 the yew in the churchyard and found its circum- 

 ference to be twenty-four feet six inches, whereas a 

 hundred years ago it was twenty-three feet, and were 

 thus able to ascertain its growth during the period. 

 It is a tall and shapely tree, although its body is well 

 described as "squat, short, and thick." White 

 estimated its age as "several centuries," only ; per- 

 haps, as many as eight may be assigned it. Little 

 symptoms of decay are visible. 



The next object of interest was the sycamore in the 

 " Plestor," which replaced the vast oak there, blown 

 down "in the amazing tempest of 1703." This 

 sycamore is not of large girth. Seated on the 

 bench around it, one could almost realise White and 

 those about him on a summer evening. Thither, 

 too, at the end of the day, the young botanists of our 

 party repaired to spread their floral treasures on the 

 green, and compete for prizes offered for the best 

 collections of wild flowers. One brought seventy, 

 and another sixty species, correctly named. It was 

 also easy to imagine how pleased the veteran natu- 

 ralist would have been to have witnessed the interest 

 now taken by many in the pursuits he so dearly 

 loved, but which in his days were confined to few. 



Selborne Hanger is probably much as it was of 

 yore ; some of the party ascended it by the zigzag, 

 others breasted the steep. Mr. W. Jeffery, searching 

 for molluscs, found, climbing the beeches, Clausilia 

 rugosa, C. laminata, Helix rufesccns (pale variety), 

 H. lapicida, and other common species, with the rare 

 Bulimus monfamis and B. obsairus. There, too, we 

 heard the notes of the wood wren, the tree pipit, the 

 tree sparrow, and the nightingale, and listened to the 

 laugh of the yafile. On plants intent, my search was 

 rewarded by Epipadis latifolia, Ncottia nidus avis, 

 Listera ovata. Daphne laurcola, and Lysimachia 

 nemorum ; and, conducted by a lady pioneer, we 

 went on to the High Wood, which much resembles 

 parts of the New Forest. Our object was to find the 

 green hellebore, said to grow there ; but after much 

 search the plant turned out to be the bear's-foot, 

 which occurred in profusion, and was just going out 

 of flower. White has well noted its most obvious 



distinction — the presence of the dark -green leaves of 

 the previous year, whereas //. viridis dies down in 

 the winter, and has all its foliage of a paler hue. 

 H.fcetidus, considering its locality here, I am strongly 

 inclined to consider indigenous, notwithstanding 

 Watson's doubt on the subject. 



As to the wildness of H. viridis, both in Hants 

 and Sussex, there can be no question. The after- 

 noon was passed in exploring the " Liths." There 

 we met with Lithospermiim officinale, and in a low- 

 lying meadow observed a plant, by no means common 

 in the district, and unrecorded by White — the snake 

 weed, Polygomim bistorta, said by Gerard to be good 

 "against the biting of serpents and other venomous 

 beasts." It was growing in profusion, and its pretty 

 pinkish blossoms were very conspicuous. Time 

 would not permit an examination of the boggy 

 portions of the parish. A day, indeed, little suffices 

 for investigating a place which afforded material for a 

 lifelong study, yet on our return all agreed that very 

 great pleasure had been experienced from the " finds " 

 made, the charming scenery, and the manifold 

 associations which clung about Selborne. 



VARIATION IN THE MOLLUSCA, AND ITS 

 PROBABLE CAUSE. 



By Joseph W. Williams. 



Part II. — V.\riety-naming more fully con- 

 sidered. 



I HAVE, in the first part of my article, considered 

 one or two main points as to the futility of a too 

 promiscuous variety-naming, and I now proceed to 

 consider the subject more fully as to how far varieties 

 may be named to accord with a strict scientific sense ; 

 that is, on a scientific basis of value, and as to how 

 far they may not be named to accord with a strict 

 scientific sense or basis of value. I wish it to be well 

 understood that Science does not concern herself with 

 handing the names of variety-mongers, appended to 

 the varieties they have latinised, down to posterity, 

 but that she rather and only concerns herself with 

 varieties just so much as will help her to render unto 

 posterity a true and faithful cause of those variations. 

 This promiscuous variety-naming has its source in 

 one narrow specialised circle — the plates at the end 

 of a shell-book ; this being all the knowledge that a 

 variety-monger aspires to. He knows a shell when 

 he sees it and can call it by its specific name and 

 perhaps by a new-fangled variety-name, but a school- 

 boy with a small knowledge of shells, a little practi- 

 cal tact, and just as much an acquaintance with the 

 dead languages, could do as well as he has done. 

 Outside this narrow circle he is a simple Peter Bell : 

 outside that he knows no more about nature than 

 Peter Bell did of the yellow primrose by the river's 

 brim. He can tell you nothing about the structure 

 and physiology of the animal that inhabits the shell 



