1903- Notes. 107 



Sweet Briar in New Zealand, the fable of the woodman and the snake 

 ought not to be forgotten. Captain Bagwell-Purefoy in his recent article 

 describes attempts to substitute exotic species of Rhammis for the native 

 kinds, and to naturalize the south European Goncptetyx cleopatra on both 

 native and foreign Buckthorns. These experiments, if conducted on 

 scientific lines, are interesting, and will not easily lead to confusion, 

 especially if the facts be made public. But against introductions such as 

 that of G. rhamni in Tipperary, or, to quote an equally flagrant recent 

 example, the Tawny Owl in Co, Down, we enter our strongest protest. 



The need of a protest on this subject is further shown by an editorial 

 paragraph in Nature (Dec. 18, 1902, p. 158), where a short account of 

 Capt. Bagwell-Purefoy's introductions is given without a word of 

 reprobation. Perhaps this is not to be wondered at when the writer of 

 the paragraph implies that the Buckthorns are not native in Tipperary, 

 and indulges in the alarmingly inaccurate statement that the Brimstone 

 Butterfly " is found at Killarney and has been reported from Wicklow, 

 but is not a native of any other part of Ireland." We deeply regret that 

 our leading scientific magazine should thus make light of falsifications 

 of the geographical record, and should then, as we know to be the case, 

 refuse to insert a temperately worded protest from that naturalist who 

 has done more than any other in recent years to unravel the mysteries 

 of Irish distribution. We suppose this is another instance of how 

 ignorance and the practice and toleration of introduction go together. 



The Editors. 



BOTANY. 



Biccia glaucescens Carr. in Ireland. 



At page 18 of the present volume of the Irish Naturalist, is a notice of 

 the hepatic Riccia glaucescens Carr. found by Mr. M'Ardle, September, 

 1902, in county Donegal, being shown to the Dublin Microscopical Club 

 as " not previously reported from Ireland," and " an interesting addition 

 to the Irish cryptogamic flora." But it has been already recorded 

 from county Antrim, in the /oumal of Botany {or September, 1895, and in 

 the Irish Naturalist for October, 1895, and I have in my herbarium the 

 original specimens which are referred to in these records. 



H. W. IvETT. 

 Loughbrickland. 



Lesser Dodder in Wicklow. 



From the International Catalogue of Scientific Literature, Botany, 1901, we 

 get a reference to Nature Notes, 1901, p. 198, where will be found a record 

 of Cuscuta Epithymu7n from the Dargle, Co. Wicklow. 



