THOMAS HOPKIRK OF DALBETH. 205 



differs in the whole plant being smaller, leaves 

 much narrower in proportion to their length, and 

 the whole plant being hairy, and particularly in the 

 capsule being entire, and not notched. It flowers in 

 June and July. 



" Veronica hirsuta. Spec. char. Corymbus ter- 

 minal. Leaves opposite, oval, entire, acute, set with 

 hairs on the upper side and edges. Capsule com- 

 pressed, not notched." 



Sir William Jackson Hooker, referring to this 

 plant in his Flora Scotica (1821), says: "It is not 

 without considerable hesitation that I have published 

 this as really distinct from V. officiyialis" He then 

 enumerates the characteristics of the plant that 

 appear permanent, and adds : " The discovery of 

 this curious little plant is due to Mr. James Smith, 

 a very able and intelligent botanist, of the Nursery- 

 Ground, Monkswood-Grove, Ayr." Again, in his 

 British Flora, he says: "It has all the api^earance 

 of a starved plant of V. officinalis, and the floicers 

 are very generally abortive. The fruit certainly 

 differs in wanting the deep notch at the extremity; 

 and the plant remains unaltered, in this res^^ect, for 

 a succession of years in cultivation." 



In Hooker and Arnott's British Flora, and in 

 Hooker's Student's Flora, it is merely given as a 

 variety of V. offici7\alis. 



Lindley seems to have considered it a distinct 

 species, and the equivalent of V. setigera, Don. 



Watson in his Compendium of tlie Cybele Britayinica 

 mentions it among his ambiguities, thus : " Veronica 

 (officinalis) hirsuta, Hopkirk. . . . Ayrshire only, 

 and now extinct?" 



In Sowerby's English Botany, Dr. Boswell Syme 

 classes it under Veronica officinalis as variety h. He 

 says : " Var. b., of which I have seen no wild speci- 

 mens, is a very remarkable form, which preserves 

 its characteristics under cultivation ; but I hesitate 

 to consider it as a sub-species, because the typical 

 plant is liable to great variation in the very points 



