Mr Mackay on the Botany of Ireland. 367 



On the Burren mountains, county of Clare, the mountain of 

 Avens, Dryas octopetala, which is also found in Antrim, is most 

 abundant ; and the Potentilla Jruticosa^ which is found plenti- 

 fully at Rock ForcL , near Gort, is also worthy of notice. Ben 

 Bulben and the other adjoining limestone mountains in the 

 county of Sligo are interesting to the botanist, in producing the 

 rare Arcnaria ciliata, together with a good many other alpine 

 plants, some of which may be mentioned, viz. — Silene acaulis, 

 Alchemilla alpiiia, Thalictrum alpinum, Oxyr'ia reniformis, 

 Rkodiola rosea ; and since the publication of Flora Hibernica, 

 Sax'tfraga nivalis^ an inhabitant of the highest cliffs of Ben 

 Lomond, Ben Lawers, and other mountains in the Highlands 

 of Scotland, has been added to our Flora, by John Wynne, 

 Esq, of Hazlewood. 



The Donegal mountains, as far as they have been explored, 

 do not appear to have any plants peculiar to them ; but the ad- 

 joining county of Antrim contains some of the rarer productions 

 of our island, of which Orohanche ruhra^ found on the trap- 

 rocks of Magilligan and on the Cave Hill near Belfast, may be 

 noticed, and Arenaria verna in the former station. On a moun- 

 tain near Garvagh in the same county, Mr Moore, the able bo- 

 tanist attached to the Ordnance Survey, has found three species 

 of Pyrola^ viz : — Pyrola media, minor, and secunda, the only 

 habitat in Ireland for the last-named species. Mr Moore has 

 also found in Antrim, Car ex Buxhaumii and Calamagrostis 

 lappomca, new to the British and Irish Floras. 



In the neighbourhood of Dublin, from its vicinity to the sea 

 and mountains, a large proportion of the plants of Ireland is to 

 be found ; and the botanist will be well rewarded by visiting 

 Howth, Portmarnock Sands, Killiney hill, and the adjoining 

 county of Wicklow ; but as the habitats of all the rarer plants 

 are given in our Flora, it is unnecessary to enumerate them in 

 this short sketch. 



Doctor Taylor, the celebrated Cryptogamic botanist, has well 

 described the Mosses, Hepatica?, and Lichens of Ireland in the 

 second part of the Flora Hibernica, from which it will be seen 

 that our island is rich in those minute vegetables. In the last- 

 mentioned family, the lichenes — he has described many species 



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