78 The Irish JVaturalisi. 



profusely down to sea-level in the Arans. And the Aran form, 

 when growing in moist situations, frequently approaches in 

 laxity of growth to the Brandon kS. hirta, so that the sole 

 remaining distinction left between the two forms is to be 

 found in the more profuse hairiness of the alpine plant. 

 Under change of conditions all the forms of this bewildering 

 group are probably highly flexible. A very weak straggling 

 form which I gathered last July on Crookaline mountain, 

 north-east of I^ough Currane, Co. Kerry, at a height of i,8oo 

 feet, where it grows profusely in mossy rills, entangled with 

 luxuriant Chrysosplenhtm, has developed, when grown in an 

 open situation in my garden, into a cushion of dense even- 

 headed rosettes. A serious attempt to reduce to order 

 the Irish hypnoid saxifrages by a study of a full series of 

 authentic dried specimens, and of plants under cultivation 

 from Aran, Kerry, Ben Bulben, and Antrim, might, perhaps, 

 give some positive results. 



The second day in Aranmore was given up chiefly to an 

 examination of the sandy tracts around Killeany, towards the 

 south-east of the island, and the most notable result was the 

 discovery of a quantity of the elegant little Astragalus hypo- 

 glottis, nowhere native in Ireland outside the Aran Islands, 

 lyough Atalia, a brackish pool near the shore of Killeany 

 bay, was carefully searched, and, though I failed to discover 

 Meriyanthes, recorded from this station by Mr. Hart, I found 

 here the only horsetail of the islands, noted but not determined 

 by him in August, 1869. It turns out to be Eqiiisetuvi arvense. 

 Close by the same pool a few plants of Lysimachia nemorum 

 turned up, a species apparently not recorded from these 

 islands since the visit of Dr. Wright in 1866. The stately 

 Alliinn babi?igtonii was abundant, both in sandy places near 

 the shore, and in deep clefts of the rock. This species, the 

 " Inyon feechaun,'" or wild onion of the islanders, was 

 formerly grown in small quantities in the garden plots of the 

 Arans for use as an anthelmintic; but I could discover no 

 certain tradition that it had ever been grown for culinary 

 purposes. Allium ursinum, the ''Gaurlyoge" or Garlic of 

 the natives, is thoroughly well-established in rock-terraces 

 close by I^ough Atalia at a distance from ruins or dwellings. 



(a"0 BB CONCI.UDKD.) 



' Throughout these notes I have endeavoured to represent phonetically 

 the Irish plant names. 



