I66 The Irish Nat7iralist. October, 



its several rocky hills reaching 300 feet. These hills occupy 

 three extensive lobes which form the northern part of 

 the island, and also a fourth area on the southern shore. 

 Between these northern and southern uplands, filling the 

 centre of the island, is an extensive, swelling, smooth- 

 surfaced tract of drift, highly tilled. The peaty covering 

 of the hills has been almost entirely stripped for fuel, and 

 the ground is a mere waste, relieved for the botanist only 

 by the continued abundance of Hclianthemum giiitatum. 

 Three of the five lakes of the island lie within this hilly 

 area. Lough Fawna, in the centre, has beautifully clear 

 water, with an immense profusion of Littorella, inter- 

 spersed in the deeper portions with the rare Isoetes cchino- 

 s-pora, and other plants. Lough Gowlanagower is also 

 delightfully clear. Looking down through the water, one 

 sees a lovely continuous sward, formed of about two parts 

 of Isotes cchinospora to one part of Lobelia Dortmanna , 

 every interstice between these plants being filled with 

 Elatine hexandra, with here and there a cloudy mass of 

 Apium inttndatum. The surface is lined with the long 

 straight leaves of Sparganium affine, and everywhere 

 broken by the myriad nodding heads of the Water Lobelia. 

 Lough Nagrooaun adjoining is, on the contrary, filled with 

 algae ; its shores are fringed with an exuberant growth of 

 Eriocaulon septangularc. Lough Bofin, which lies at the head 

 of one of the northern bays, is brackish, filled with algae 

 and smelly mud, and fringed with a salt-marsh flora. 



The cultivated drift area is almost as unpromising for 

 the botanist as the naked hills, yielding indeed a more 

 varied flora, but one in which common species and weed- 

 plants hold the chief place. By far the richest ground 

 is the valley which, continuing the deprassion which forms 

 the harbour, runs eastward from it, past Church Lough. 

 There is comparative shelter here, and Church Lough 

 itself is surrounded with tall reeds and filled with water-lilies. 

 On the southern side of this valley the hill descends 

 in little rocky scarps, while on the northern side, opposite 

 and beyond Church Lough, the influence of the sand-dunes 

 makes itself felt, neutralizing the peatyness of the soil and 



