THE BOTANY OF BERMUDA. 45 



acetosella. The "sage brush" is mentioned, but not identified ; also a 

 species of Verhetia and a Mcdicago. He appears to have regretted his 

 inability to procure ripe berries of the cedar, owing to his visit being 

 during the flowering season, as it was his desire to have introduced the 

 tree into the island of Corsica and the southern departments of France 

 which border on the Mediterranean. 



The earliest general list of Plants was compiled by Mr. A. W. Lance, 

 naval school-master on board H. M. S. Illustrious, in 1845. It contains 

 127 species, but is unpublished. The MS. presented by Governor Reid 

 is in the Public Library, Ilamilton. Grisebach occasionally refers to 

 his herbarium. Dr. Eein, who resided in Bermuda, about 1853, in the 

 capacity of tutor, printed, 1873, a list comprising LVI orders and 128 

 species, exclusive of Algje.* In the same year, Mr. J. Matthew Jones 

 published a paper on the vegetation of the Bermudas, in the Proceed- 

 ings and Transactions of the Kova Scotia Institute of Natural Science. 



Grisebach notes about 18 West Indian plants as natives of Bermu- 

 das in his flora of the British West Indian Islands, 1864, but had evi- 

 dently very imperfect information before him. 



Mr. H. R. Moseley, naturalist and botanical collector of H. M. S. Chal- 

 lenger, had the good fortune to visit the islands at a favorable time of 

 year (in parts of April, May, and June, 1873), and collected plants with 

 indefatigable diligence, but, of course, missed those which flower in 

 autumn. Lastly, the writer, with a very slender knowledge of botany, 

 made it an object and pursuit, during a residence of nearly six years, to 

 make himself acquainted with the flora of the island, and found in Sir 

 Joseph Hooker, Dr. Asa Gray, General Munro, Professor Sargent, Pro- 

 fessor Oliver, and Professor Thiselton Dyer, friends ever ready to 

 identify any specimen sent to them. From all these sources, aided by 

 a too brief visit from Professor Ernst, of Caracas, in 1876, has the sub- 

 joined enumeration been compiled, and it is presented in tolerable con- 

 fidence that there are not many native plants left unenumerated. There 

 are, doubtless, plants in old gardens which have escaped notice; noth- 

 ing but a house to house visitation can exhaust the possibilities of fresh 

 discovery in this direction. The Bermudians of the last generation, 

 and long before it, were eminently a sea-faring people, leaving at home 

 their wives, and families, and slaves, and constantly returning with 

 some rarity which had attracted their notice. Thus Ipomoea tuberosa^ 



* Rein, Ueber die Vegetations- Verbiiltnisse der Bermuda Inselu, <^SeuckenbergischQ 

 naturforscbende Gesellscbaft. Frankfort, 1872-73. 



