HARD WICKE'S SCIENCE- G OSSIP. 



1J 5 



" Flowers: Their Origin, Shapes, Perfumes, 

 and Colours." By J. E. Taylor, F.L.S., &c. Lon- 

 don : Hardwicke & Bogue. — The position we hold in 

 relation to this book prevents our doing otherwise than 

 drawing attention to its publication, although this op- 

 portunity affords us the means of thanking both Printer 

 and Publisher alike for turning out so handsome and 

 attractive a volume. The arrangement of the con- 

 tents is as follows: — Chapter I, "The Old and the 

 New Philosophy of Flowers ;" 2, "The Geological 

 Antiquity of Flowers and Insects;" 3, "The Geogra- 

 phical Distribution of Flowers;" 4, Ditto {continued); 

 5, " The Structure of Flowering Plants;" 6, "Rela- 

 tions between Flowers and their Physical Surround- 

 ings;" 7, " Relations between Flowers and the 

 Wind;" 8, "The Colours of Flowers;" 9, "The 

 External Shapes of Flowers;" 10, "The Internal 

 Shapes of Flowers;" II, "The Perfumes of Flowers;" 

 12, "Social Flowers;" 13, "Birds and Flowers;" 

 14, "The Natural Defences of Flowering Plants." 

 The work is embellished with thirty-two coloured 

 figures, and nearly one hundred and fifty woodcuts. 



Botanical Curiosities. — Most of these facts 

 were communicated by me to the Natural History 

 Journal (W. Sessions, York), a monthly magazine, 

 intended to encourage young people in the prosecution 

 of scientific pleasures. 'By one path in one field at 

 Woodhouse, near Sheffield, three forms otPlantago 

 major have been gathered: — (1) spike bifid; (2) the 

 very small bracts developed into little foliage-leaves, 

 over an inch long below, and lessening towards the 

 top, so as to form an elongated cone, in which the 

 flowers themselves were still present; (3) flowers on 

 branches from the main stem, i.e., in a raceme instead 

 of a spike. The last form, being very handsome, we 

 have tried to keep in our garden; vainly, however, for 

 it bears no seed, and after two or three years, it dies. 

 Near Sheffield, also, we picked two specimens of 

 Scabiosa arvensis ; one with its involucrum bracts so 

 large as to extend far out from under the head of 

 florets; the other, long since transplanted into our 

 gardens, where it receives the admiration of all its 

 beholders, with globe-shaped heads of flowers, the 

 peculiar outer ones being absent. In Sherwood 

 Forest, between Edwinstowe and Mansfield Wood- 

 house, in a sandy lane, in company with Plantago 

 coronopus, was a fasciated specimen of Crepis vircns, 

 several stalks appearing as a single flat one, i T ^ 

 inch broad all the way up, and clustered at its 

 summit with flowers. By Wharncliffe Crags, in the 

 Don Valley, a birch, 9 inches at least in diameter, 

 appears at a height of about 12 feet, from out the 

 trunk of an old oak. In a valley through which runs 

 a stream, dividing Yorkshire from Derbyshire, a little 

 tributary of the Rother, once crystal-clear and trout 

 inhabited, now anon black from "sleek washing," 

 and again ochre-yellow from the pumpings out of a 

 colliery, we gathered a dandelion with leaves 2 feet 



long, and proportionately broad; also another with 

 twin heads on one scape. In a valley by Coal-Aston, 

 near Dronfield, Orchis maeulala appeared in various 

 shades of hue till nearly pure white. White Columbine 

 occurred in Hell Wood — a splendid locality by Roche 

 Abbey, near Rotherham. White Hair-bells (Campa- 

 nula 7-otundifolia) occurred in Monsall Dale, near Bake- 

 well. My experience is identical with that of a recent 

 writer in Science-Gossip, in the process of drying, 

 White Hair-bells turn blue ; Blue Hair-bells, white. 

 Linnxus named the Red and White Campions, Lychnis 

 diurna and L. vespertina, as one species — L. dioica. 

 In Cliff Wheel Wood (Rother Valley), a bed of Red 

 Campion contained several with white blossoms; nor 

 is it rare to see White Campion, in fields or waysides, 

 assuming a rosy tint. In Hail-Mary Hill Wood 

 (named, as some suppose, from signalling made to the 

 unfortunate "Queen of Scots," then imprisoned in 

 the Earl of Shrewsbury's Sheffield Manor, which is 

 visible from the wood) we collected a Lychnis diurna, 

 with leaves all triple-pointed. Near York, we saw 

 all these with white blooms: — Trifolium pratense, 

 Geranium pusillum, Scabiosa succisa, Calluna vul- 

 garis, Erica tetralix. In the extreme north of 

 Derbyshire, Raphauits raphanistrtcm, the Wild 

 Radish, was both white and brimstone-yellow. On 

 September 20, at Castle Howard, near Malton, a 

 Dog-Violet ( Viola sylvatica ?), had three unjoined 

 carpels, holding seed, and accompanied by a few small 

 calyciform bracts; Water-cress (Nasturtium officinale) 

 was also in flower, and a tangled mass of it rose 

 5 feet, at least, out of the water. Rumex alpinus is a 

 I species, doubtfully indigenous ; it still grows by One- 

 ash Farm, near Monyash, N. Derbyshire ; but this 

 homestead, long tenanted by the Quaker family of 

 Bowmans, was once a place of exile and " durance 

 vile " for the refractory brethren of a Yorkshire 

 Abbey ; it is well-known that monks esteemed it 

 virtuous as a healer, and grew it in their herb-gardens. 

 My friend, Alfred Montague Grimsley, of Leicesfer, 

 found bifid and trifid catkins of Salix fragilis by the 

 river Foss, near York. My brother, F. T. Le 

 Tall, observed albids of Orchis pyramidalis and Ceu- 

 taurea nigra, near Scarborough ; he also plucked a 

 Rose (Rosa villosa ?), fully .double, many yards from 

 any house, some miles from any village, in one of the 

 deep, narrow, well-wooded, and well-watered gullies 

 lying amid the moorland which extends from Levi- 

 sham, near Pickering, to Scarborough. — B. B. Le 

 Tall, York. 



"The Hi-story of Bible Plants." — Under this 

 title, Messrs. Hardwicke & Bogue have just pub- 

 lished an attractive little book, written by Mr. J. 

 Smith, A.L. S., of Kew, the well-known botanist. It 

 is abundantly illustrated with lithographic plates by 

 Mr. W. H. Fitch, F.L.S., perhaps the best botanical 

 draughtsman of the day. Mr. Smith's name as author 

 is enousdi to ensure fulness and correctness of detail. 



