26o 



HARDWICKKS SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



Sagacious Potatoes. — The following remarkable 

 instance of " sagacity " on the part of the common 

 vegetable, the potatoe, has recently come under my 

 notice, and is, I think, well worth recording in your 

 columns, I have a large garden on my glebe lands, in 

 which I grow several plats of potatoes, amongst 

 which last year I had an excellent strain of some 

 early varieties. When the faded appearance of the 

 haulm denoted that the tubers were sufficiently 

 matured, I got what remained, after having had my 

 table supplied with them for eight weeks, of two 

 particularly good kinds, dug out. And they were 

 spread on the surface of the earth, in order to expose 

 them to the greening action of the sun's rays, that 

 they might keep the better for "seed" for the next 

 season's planting. One lot was of long, white, ash- 

 leaf kidneys, the other was a species like the 

 American Rose, but flatter in shape, whose name I 

 do not know. Well, a few days after my man had 

 raised the crop, and spread it on a border, I went to 

 see how they were getting on, and if they were ready 

 for storing in the root-house. "When I was some yards 

 distant from the plat where they had been placed, I 

 became aware that a change had come over them. 

 For, instead of their being the proper dirty yellowish- 

 white and pink colours, I found that all, except a few 

 that were suffering from Pcronospora mfestajis, had 

 cunningly made themselves of the same hue as the 

 earth on which they lay. The diseased tubers alone 

 retained their original white or pink colour, being 

 too weak from disease to use any mental or bodily 

 exertion. Now, what was the object in this altered 

 appearance which the potatoes had assumed ? And 

 after considering the matter, I can suppose nothing 

 else than that these potatoes of mine intended to try 

 and escape my notice, and that of my man, and so 

 avoid being carried away, and washed, and cooked 

 and eaten. Every tuber, except the sick ones, had 

 good eyes, and they had seen during the summer 

 weeks many a basketful of their companions taken 

 off to the kitchen, and so they determined to avoid 

 such a wretched fate. And I have not the least 

 doubt that the descendants of these sagacious 

 potatoes will be able in the course of time, not only 

 to change the colour of their skins at the approach of 

 danger, but to bury themselves beneath the soil, like 

 the way moles do, at a moment's notice. — H. IV. 

 Lett, M.A. 



The Old Botanical Book. — It is written in the 

 Linnsean method, and now every one possesses one 

 on the national system. Well, if it wont sell to the 

 general public, let us advertise it to the geologist, for 

 it will help him to understand the evolution of the 

 flowers from the ferns, and in tracing the diversity of 

 parts it will explain the change that has come over 

 their families. It is, in fact, an interpolated chronicle 

 from the earlier Tertiary, the lime of flowers, with 

 allusions to that which went before : but to under- 



stand it rightly, they say, we should begin at the end 

 like Hebrew, and read it backwards. Does any 

 desire to know that the labiates are proud of their 

 history, let him proceed to the water-brink and pluck 

 the water horehound (Lycopi/s europaus)^ and if he 

 then refers to this book of heraldry, he will discover 

 that he has in his hand a degenerate or undeveloped 

 member of the family, a scrapegrace that, with the 

 naked seeds, square stem, and faint scent of its kind, 

 hangs out whorls of unshaped blossoms, including but 

 a single pair of stamens to pro-create its like. — A. H. 

 Su'inton. 



LiNUM PERENNE, L. — In Sir W. J. Hooker's 

 "British Flora," the localities given for this plant are 

 as follows : "Cambridgeshire ; Hinton, Northampton- 

 shire ; Norfolk and Suffolk ; Westmoreland ; near 

 Moncktown, Ireland." That would of course 

 imply that it was very local, but nothing is said as 

 to its rarity in its habitats. Northamptonshire 

 and Suffolk must have been then (about 1838) its 

 most southern localities known. In the " Student's 

 Flora" (1S84) it is noted as growing "on chalky 

 soils from Durham to Essex ; very rare," so that by 

 this time it had been recorded as far south as Essex. 

 If this plant be rare in the sense of its localities being 

 so limited, it would certainly seem to be abundant in 

 one place where it grows, namely, one of the Gog 

 Magog Hills, near Cambridge ; I found it there last 

 Whitsuntide (early in June) and the roadside was 

 quite spangled with its bright blue flowers. With 

 regard to its record for Essex, Mr. John S. 

 Carrington, F.L.S., tells me that he found it growing 

 on the roadside between Leigh and Hadleigh, quite 

 in the south of that county. It was early in August, 

 and only half-a-dozen plants were in flower, it being 

 past the flowering time, which is given in the 

 "Student's Flora" as from "June to July." It 

 would be interesting to hear of any record further 

 south, in Kent, for instance ; though I suppose in 

 these days, when counties are so thoroughly worked, 

 there will hardly be any chance of such being the 

 case. — Archibald L. Clarke. 



GEOLOGY, &c. 



ALL THE WORLD'S A STAGE ; 



A GEOLOGICAL PARODY. 



All the world's a stage 

 And all the men and beasties merely players ; 

 They have their exits and their entrances. 

 And in former ages played they many parts, 

 Their acts being seven ages. First Eozoon* 

 Lapped in the bosom of primceval seas. 

 And then the happy Trilobitc,\ with "compound 



eyes," 

 And " swimming feet," that crept in mud now turned 



* Archaean aera. 



t Cambrian period. 



