PHYTOLOGY, 



PLANTS OF ICELAND AND OF THE FAKOE ISLANDS 



NOT KNOWN AS BKITISH. 



By ARTHUR BENNETT, F.L.S. 



IN the preface to the third edition of the Student's Flora, Sir J. D. 

 Hooker remarks that he had been " urged by very competent 

 botanists to include the Faroe Islands as really more British, 

 geographically, than are the Channel Isles ; but, if I did so, Iceland 

 should also be included, and on the whole I have thought it best 

 to retain the old limits of the British Flora." The plants of these is- 

 lands might have been given as an appendix, but as this was not done, 

 I have thought a list of their ex-British plants might be acceptable 

 to readers of the Scottish Naturalist, especially as it is to Scottish 

 botanists that we must look for the addition of any of these species 

 to our Flora. At first it would seem an easy task to write down 

 these species that are not to be found in our Floras ; and this 

 would be so if only one authority were taken, but on collating the 

 various publications on the Floras, it was found to be a work 

 of some difficulty to make them agree, the proportion of doubtful 

 plants (especially Icelandic) being very large. I have, however, 

 relied principally on Groenlund's Islands Flora and Babington's 

 Revision of the Flora of Iceland for Iceland, and Rostrup's Fcer- 

 cernes Flora for the Faroes. Yet to show the difference even here 

 while Groenlund has only 357 species, Babington has 467 ; but this 

 difference is more apparent than real, as Babington numbers most 

 of the doubtful plants, while Groenlund is excessively cautious in 

 regard to what he admits and numbers. 



Icelandic plants not known as British are the following : — 

 Ranunculus glacialis, L. ; R. hyperboreus, L. j R. pyg- 

 maDUS, Wahlenb.; R. nivalis, L. 



