204? Plantago major, Plantago lanceolata, 



talcen alive in Ireland. — At the meeting of the Belfast Natural 

 History Society, on Dec. 23. 1835, Mr. W. Thompson, V.P., 

 exhibited, through the kindness of Mr. R. Ball of Dublin, 

 Cor. Mem., a fine specimenof the locust (Zvocusta migratbria), 

 measuring 5 in. across the wings. It was captured near Ard- 

 more, in the county of Waterford, in September, 1835, and 

 brought alive to Miss M. Ball of Youghal, a lady who has, 

 for some time past, given considerable attention to native 

 entomology, and whose collection, already extensive, is now 

 enriched by this first specimen of the locust obtained in Ire- 

 land.— J 1 . 



Plants. — [Plantago major, with a Panicle ofBracteas hav- 

 ing the Place of the Inflorescence^ — This specimen of a very 

 curious and rare variety of the greater plantain (Plantago 

 major) was gathered, by my eldest daughter (Ruth), in a lane 

 about half a mile from Oxford, going from Longmeadow to the 

 village of Iffley, on Sunday last, July 26. 1835. It appears to 

 be the Plantago major var. y of Sir J. E. Smith ; P. major var. 

 /3 paniculata of Gray's Nat. Arr. of Brit. Plants; and Plantago 

 major panicula sparsa of Ray's Synopsis, p. 314. The spike 

 is abortive, and branches into a panicle, with small leaf-like 

 bracteas. Ray calls it the " Besome Plantain, or, Plantain 

 with spoky tufts. ; ' It was first observed in the Isle of Thanet, 

 by Dr. Johnson, in the year 1632; and it has been found, 

 more recently, near Ripton, in Huntingdonshire, by Mr. 

 Woodward; and at Bedingham, near Bungay, Suffolk, by 

 Mr. Stone. It is figured in Johnson's edition of Gerard's 

 Herbal, p. 4-20. ; and in Parkinson's Theatrum Botanicum, 

 p. 494. — W. Baxter. Botanic Garden, Oxford, July 29. 1835. 



P.S. Since writing the above, I have been looking over 

 your Magazine of Natural History, and find that there is, in 

 III. 482., a figure (apparently copied from Gerard) of the 

 same variety, and a notice of a specimen of it which had been 

 found near Durham. — W. 13. 



The specimen sent by Mr. Baxter differs from the figure 

 in III. 482., in the panicle exceeding 2 in. in length ; in its 

 having a pretty symmetrically conical outline, with the lowest 

 and lower compound spikes having a peduncle about a quarter 

 of an inch long, and those more and more upward, less and 

 less long. The spikes in the terminal part of the panicle 

 (whether simple or compound, it is not easy to see) are sessile, 

 and so closely situate as to, in the specimen which has been 

 pressed, imbricate each other. The peduncled compound 

 spikes arise each from the axil of a bractea, and, I think, each 

 of the spikes and spikelets too. 



Plantago lanceolata, Instances of kinds of Monstrosity in. — 



