Planls. 537 



an insufficient cause for the effect produced, is, that I last 

 year gathered specimens of ling (Calliina vulgaris), some of 

 which I have still by me, in which the flowers on one part 

 were white, while, on other parts, they were of the usual 

 colour ; and these various-coloured flowers grew upon dif- 

 ferent branches of the same plant, the produce of one root. 

 This specimen was exposed to the same light and shade, and 

 to the same degree of drought and moisture, as all the other 

 ling, which grew so abundantly about it; and, certainly, I 

 think it is impossible that any accidental manuring, which 

 would affect its root, could cause the flowers of one part of 

 the stem to take a different hue from those of another : any 

 such cause must have affected the whole plant alike. — 

 C Conway, Pontnemydd Works, near Newport, Monmouth' 

 shire. May 16. 1834. 



A Search for a repoi^ted curious Plant which grows in the 

 Level that conveys the Water from Auchenbowie Coal Works, 

 and from the old Coal Workings of Bannockburn. — At the 

 time we set off' on our journey, the sun was glancing from 

 behind the Ochils, and with his fiery rays making darkness 

 retreat to its gloomy caverns. We bade a temporary fare- 

 well to the glorious luminary, lighted our lamps, and de- 

 scended to the regions below; not where Orpheus went in 

 search of his Eurydice, but only to the secondary formation 

 of the earth. To give, however, an account of all the strata 

 we passed through, the angles of the rocks, and the point of 

 the compass they dip to, and of the dikes, troubles, and faults 

 that are met with in the coal formation, would be to write 

 an article on geology. We descended a pit fifty-five fathoms 

 deep ; and when we had arrived at the bottom, we 



" Glower'd about wi' canny care. 

 Lest bogles catch us unaware." 



The passage for our feet was sometimes rough, sometimes 

 smooth ; that for our back and head, sometimes high, some- 

 times low. In some places, as we went along, we saw 



" Where, gloomily retir'd. 

 The villain spider lives, cunning and fierce.'* 



with his net spread out to entrap his unsuspecting victims. 

 We think the spider was of the species ^ranea labyrinthica. 

 We thought that it had " come to the goat/s house to thig 

 woo' ; " but, as we proceeded, several species of TipMidae were 

 seen : these would, no doubt, occasionally come into the net ; 

 and the fine feeling of the ^ranea would, in the dark, be as 

 good as eyes. We met with beautiful specimens of the Raco- 

 dium cellare, as white as snow : whether this was owing to 



