10 ' JOTTINOS OF A NATURALIST. 



rising to a height of several hundred feet, are forests of (^ak, Pine, Ash, 

 Beech, and Whitethorn, plentifully sprinkled with Hazel, Alder, Holly, and 

 Arbutus; the great variety of the shades of green produced by these denizens 

 of the forest, forming a singularly beautiful ensemble, l^he last-mentioned 

 tree, the Strawberry tree, (Arbutus uneilo^) grows in great abundance in 

 spots where no other tree would find sufficient soil to nourish it, and is 

 here truly indigenous, at least, so say some botanists; but opinion is divided, 

 and ^adhuc sub judice lis est.' It is a very handsome and ornamental tree, 

 and at the commencement of winter, its evergreen boughs may be seen 

 bearing fruit and blossoms upon the same tree. 



It sometimes attains a large size, and an individual is pointed out to visitors 

 on Dinis Island, which is said to be the largest in Great Britciin, and 

 whose trunk measures seven feet in circumference. The whole tree is astrin- 

 gent, and, according to Pliny, it obtained the name Unedo from una and 

 edo, because one berry is a sufficient dose. Its wood is very beautiful, and 

 small articles made from it and from the curious Bog Oak, so frequent among 

 the Irish peat soil, form the staple commodities of the peasantry. The Holly, 

 also, {Ilex aquifolium^ here attains a great size, and the Yew, (Taxus 

 baccata,) may be here mentioned as forming no inconspicuous part of the 

 Killarney woods. A gigantic specimen grows in the centre of the cloisters 

 of the beautiful abbey of Muckross, whose aged arms entirely fill the 

 quadrangle, and concerning whose antiquity the abbey -keeper, a Berkshire 

 man, asserts that authentic records extend back for a period of four hundred 

 years. 



Directing our attention now to the more humble and delicate members of the 

 vegetable kingdom, I may remark that in the savagely romantic Gap of 

 Dunloe, the plant which first claims the notice, even of cockney visitors, 

 no less from the familiar appearance of its delicate petals, than from its 

 great profusion, is that cosmopolitan little saxifrage, London Pride, (Saxifraga 

 undjrosa.) Thus the same plant which rears its head in that spot where 

 nature shows herself most grand and majestic — where she appears unveiled, 

 if I may be allowed the expression, is again met with in the attic windows 

 of our smoky metropolis, whence she is banished, and where this little flower 

 is sometimes her only representative. 



A less common and mure characteristic plant, however, is the handsome 

 Butterwort, (Pingulcula gmndijiora,) whose large purple flowers attract the 

 attention of the most careless observer. Its existence, I believe, is confined 

 to this part of Britain. The common, but nevertheless beautiful. Foxglove 

 or Fairy-fingers, Litsmore of the Irish, [Digitalis purpurea.') although widely 

 distributed over the British Isles, deserves mention here as the especial 

 favourite of the good folks, those Irish Eumenides, whose head quarters are 

 here, and whose vengeance I should almost fear to draw down upon me, 

 were I to omit so essential an element of the fairy land of Killarney. There 

 are few jarts of this district in which the air is not loaded with the odours 



