118 TRANSACTIONS, NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY OF GLASGOW. 



altogether some ten specimens, several not being likely to 

 flower that year. 



In the immediate neighbourhood were large quantities of the 

 greater Twayblade, Listcra ovata, R. Br., and abundance also 

 of Orchis pyramidalis , L., with which we in Scotland have 

 but little acquaintance, together with the more widely-distributed 

 Fragrant Orchis, Gymnadenia Conopsea, Benth., with its rich 

 pungent odour. 



The circumstance of this striking plant (the Epipactis) appear- 

 ing where it did is, as Mr. Bennett remarks, odd, when one 

 comes to look at its European, and especially its Scandinavian 

 distribution, and I cannot help thinking, he adds, that it will 

 be found in one of the other isles between Colonsay and Skye; 

 and, judging from analogy, I should have said it would be more 

 likely to occur in the West of Scotland than in the East. 



That Epipactis palustris is but a rare plant with us may 

 be gathered from the fact that Professor Trail, in his Topo- 

 graphical Botany of Scotland, is only able to give it for three 

 lowland counties on the east — Berwick, Haddington, and Mid- 

 lothian; from Fife also, and from the three divisions of Perth- 

 shire, in all of which I believe it is a scarce plant. 



In England it is widely distributed, and recorded as occur- 

 ring in 59 of the 71 vice-counties. In Ireland, Mr. Praeger 

 describes it as a characteristic plant of the Central Plain, 

 thinning out in the north and east. 



There are five British species of the genus Epipactis, several 

 of them much alike ; palustris, whose habitat is marshy ground, 

 is about a foot high, with stem leafy, flowers few, the outer 

 leaves of the perianth green, striped with red. Orchis plants 

 most commonly rise from ovate or palmate tubers. Of Epipactis, 

 however, and some other genera, e.g., Cephal anther a, the 

 rootstock is a fibrous and creeping one, well seen in Cephalan- 

 thera ensi folia, of which an Arran specimen is shown for 

 comparison. 



