TRANSACTIONS. 331 



to tlic period during whicli seeds may retain tlicir vitality. 

 Seeds taken from tlie herbarium of Tournefort, French 

 Botanist, germinated after the lapse of nearly a century. 



Another very remarkable instance is narrated by an Eng- 

 lish writer, Dr. Lindley : '•' I have now before me," says he, 

 " three plants of raspberries, which have been raised in the 

 gardens of the Horticultural Society from seeds taken from the 

 stomach of a man whose skeleton was found thirty feet below 

 the surface of the earth, at the bottom of a liarrow (a largo 

 artificial mound) which was opened near Dorchester. He 

 had been buried with coins of the Emperor Hadrian, and 

 must have been there 1600 or 1700 years." 



Since writing the first of this article, my memory has 

 brought up to me an instance of the extensive and singular 

 distribution of seeds, that came within my own delighted 

 observation in my boyhood. 



About a mile from the village where I then lived, was a 

 thick, dark wood, which extended a long way in every direc- 

 tion. For some cause several acres in the very centre of 

 the wood had been cleared. Very thick were the tall, 

 black stumps, while all around stood the " old" growth of 

 the pinewood forest. This clearing was accessible on two 

 opposite sides by a narrow and winding cart path. The 

 summer that I first recall as associated with this field, was 

 its first or second season in grass, and it bore a magnificent 

 crop of mixed clover, and herdsgrass. But what respect 

 have boys for grass, if in the grass strawberries arc to be 

 found ? Alas, for the owner who had planned for a nice 

 field of grass, it came to bo whispered about among the 

 boys that such another place for strawberries did not exist 

 in the known world. And it was true. As a boy — a coun- 

 try boy, I was a connoisseur in the strawberry field — but 

 never till then had my eyes fallen upon such a sight. The 

 surface of the ground beneath the grass was one mass of 

 strawberries, of a size and deliciousness tbat I had never 

 seen before, and have never seen since. The size of the 



