i897-] Praeger. — The Botany of a Railway Journey. 213 



Where the horn fell on the ground, a thicket of slender twigs 

 grew up ; " and any one who looks on it in the morning 

 fasting, will know in a moment all things that are to happen 

 that da3\"i I have searched for this thicket in vain ; but 

 possibly my want of success was the result of my visits being 

 post-prandial. 



Now we are over the summit ; Ulster lies behind us, lycinster 

 in front, and we rush down into the plain of Dundalk^ with 

 the rugged hills which surround Forkill on the right, and the 

 wooded slopes of Ravensdale Park on the left. The pace is 

 very fast, and the long bogie carriage hums like a big top, and 

 rolls like a ship at sea. We slow up as we cross the bridge 

 over the muddy river at Dundalk, and for the first time we see 

 maritime plants — Sea-Pinks and Sea-Asters, Statice DaJmsiensh 

 and Atriplex po7^titIacoides ; a moment later we draw up at the 

 broad island-platform of the new station. Here we are 

 again on the Ordovician grits, which are seen in low cuttings 

 on each side of the line ; but eastward and southward they are 

 buried under recent estuarine deposits. The shores of Dundalk 

 Bay are the flattest portion of Ireland that I have seen. The 

 tide ebbs nearly out of sight across the mudd}^ sands, as it 

 does at Morecambe Bay ; the shore is occupied b}' a broad 

 dreary stretch of salt-marsh, which gives way as one goes 

 inland to swampy meadows, with broad ditches and slow- 

 flowing streams. The salt-marsh is stained grey with the 

 leaves of A triplex portnlacoides, and in August is purple with 

 the flowers of Statice Bahusiensis. Artemisia maritima finds 

 its northern limit by the river below Dundalk. Two other 

 characteristic salt-marsh plants of the Dublin district, Tri- 

 foliurn fragifermn and Statice auriculcEfolia^ do not come quite 

 so far north, but appear to stop at Clogher Head, twelve miles 

 to the southward. 



Leaving Dundalk, we are soon flying across this flat 

 country. The pools by the side of the line are full of Frog- 

 bit, and we catch sight of the lovely yellow blossoms of the 

 Common Bladderwort rising out of the water. Bej'ond 

 Castlebellingham we cross the end of an extensive bog, which 

 was visited by the Dublin Field Club in 1895, on which 

 occasion Dr. M'Weene}^ obtained here a fungus new to science, 



1 See Joyce's " Old Celtic Romances " : The Chase of Slieve Cullinn. 



