19 > 3. Notes. 19 
Plants of Antrim and Down. 
Mr, A. W. Stelfox has sent me recently two plants which are worthy of 
notice in these pages. One is Saxifraga iimhrosa, " from a glen 2 J- miles 
N.N.E. of Hillsborough. It was in as natural a habitat as could possibly 
be imagined, but, as you will see, it is a garden variety of the species." 
This station matches one reported by Mr. Thomas Greer for Saxifraga Geum 
— a wild, small glen in Co. Tyrone, along one edge of which, however, a 
road ran. Both these Saxifrages are often grown in gardens, and they 
possess great vitality, so that a piece thrown down may with luck take root 
and grow ; probably these facts help to account for their occurrence in 
several places where they cannot be considered native. Mr. Stelfox's 
other plant is Arctostaphylos Uva-nrsi, which he reports as growdng in 
some quantity on the side of a gully on Agnew's Hill, Co. Antrim. The 
Bear-berry is extremely rare in the north-east, and had not been seen there 
for over seventy years till re -discovered by Mr. Lilly (a single colony) at 
Skerrywhinny. in 1908. 
R. Ll. Praegf.r. 
Dublin. 
ZOOLOGY. 
Formalin as an Insecticide. 
Owing to the remarkable efficiency of formaldehyde as a germicide 
and fungicide, some experiments were made in the plant houses of this 
College to determine its insecticidal power. Various solutions of Schering's 
formalin in water were used, giving graded strengths of formaldehyde 
from .01 to 2 per cent. These were sprayed over plants infected with 
green fly and mealy-bug. The results showed that any efficacy formalin 
might possess as an insecticide was more than counterbalanced by its 
injurious action on the plants. 
J. Charles Johnson. 
Universitv Collesfo. Cork. 
The Medicinal Leech in Ireland. 
Dr. Scharff, in an article on " The Irish Freshwater Leeches " {Irish 
Natitralist, vol. vii., 1898), refers to the occurrence of the Medicinal 
Leech {Hinido medicinalis) i Lough Mask, in 1849. The wTiter 
has recently had occasion to refer to an article by P. L. Simmonds on 
" The Trade in Leeches," in the Pharmaceutical Journal (3), i., 1870 
(pp. 521-2), in which the following statement is made : — " Lord Desart 
lately let a piece of marsh land of about 40 acres on his estate near Callan, 
