124 ^^^^ Irish Naiuralisf. July. 191 7. 



IRISH SOCIETIES. 



DUBLIN NATURALISTS' FIELD CLUB. 



June 2. — Excursion to Feltrim Hill and Malahide. — Members 

 and friends to the number of 25 assembled at Amiens Street terminus 

 and travelled by the 12.30 p.m. train to Portmarnock, when a two miles' 

 walk by the old church of Kinsaley took the party to the top of Feltrim 

 Hill. As the original form of the name shows (Faeldruim — Wolf-ridge) 

 Feltrim is a ridge rather than a hill, an isolated rocky wrinkle in the land- 

 scape running east and west for about a quarter of a mile. Kising 190 

 feet above sea-level, this ridge serves as a pedestal for the massive shaft 

 of an old derelict windmill, familiar as a landmark for many miles around. 

 Here the party took shelter and lunch while a heavy shower swept over 

 the hill accompanied by distant rumblings of thunder. When the sun 

 broke out again the conductor, J. de W. Hinch, assembled the party 

 on the summit of the ridge and with the theme of his discourse spread 

 out below him briefly sketched the geological history of the district. 



The conductor's address ended, the geologists scrambling down to the 

 quarry which cuts so monstrous a cantle out of the ridge as to threaten 

 before long to bisect it, busied themselves in fossil hunting, while the 

 smaller botanical section pushed westward over the ridge in quest of the 

 rare plants long known to inhabit Feltrim. The fossil hunters were rather 

 more successful than the botanists. Many specimens of the characteristic 

 brachiopod genera of the Lower Carboniferous Limestone, Productus, 

 Spirifera and Rhynchonella were found together with the cephalopod 

 genus Orthoceras and the polyzoon Fenestella. The botanists found 

 abundance of Trifoliiim striatum, Viola hirta and Orchis Alorio towards 

 the western end of the ridge, but failed in their search for Geraniinn 

 liicidum and 6". cclumbimwi , perhaps for lack of time to examine the rocks, 

 or because these species, always rare here, have been quarried away. 



Soon after 4 o'clock the excursion reached ISIalahide Rectory where 

 Canon and Mrs. IJndsay having dispensed afternoon tea with most genial 

 hospitality earned the further gratitude of the Club by conducting the 

 large party over their beautiful grounds. The sunken rock-garden stocked 

 with a profusion of alpines, most of them in full bloom, and including 

 the exquisite and not often successfully cultivated Daphne Cneorinii, won 

 the admiration of all. But the most curious amongst the many rare plants 

 and shrubs pointed out was a well-grown flowering specimen of the Cyiisus 

 Adami, produced in 1826 by a French grower, M. Adam of Vitry. In the 

 flower of this graft-hybrid, as it is called, a strange intermingling of the 

 characters of Cytisus piirpureiis and C". Labitrnion (the Common 

 Laburnum) is shown. The precise nature of M. Adams' Laburnum 

 has afforded matter of as heated discussion amongst bc^tanists as has 

 the nature of Oldhamia amongst palaeontologists. 



The party returned to Dublin by the 7 p.m. train after a most successful 

 dav filled with \arifd interests. 



