65 



9. — On the Botanical "Wokk of the Past Season. 

 By R. A. Pryor, B.A., F.L.S. 



[Read 11th November, 1875.] 



(Plate I.) 



Aftee a good deal of consideration I have found it necessary to 

 make some material alteration alike in the number and limits of 

 the botanical districts into which Hertfordshire has been divided, 

 and to extend the system of river-basins, originally proposed by 

 the late Mr. Coleman, to its fullest and most legitimate develop- 

 ment, by adhering strictly to the natural drainage, and by making 

 the tract of country drained by each stream a separate and in- 

 dependent division. 



The number of districts thus arrived at will perhaps be con- 

 sidered too large ; but although at first sight the arrangement may 

 appear somewhat cumbersome, it will be found that the practical 

 results more than counterbalance any seeming inconvenience ; nor 

 can there be any real disadvantage in carrying out what is believed 

 to be a sound principle, to its furthest application. 



The primary separation of the county is, of course, into the 

 two basins of the Ouse and Thames — districts which, in the Floras 

 of the future, will probably be entirely dissociated from each 

 other, and united respectively to those portions of the same river- 

 system with which they are naturally connected, but which are 

 now scattered among the southern and eastern shires. 



Beginning with that part of the basin of the Ouse which is 

 included in Herts, and which, however, comprises little more than 

 one-eighth of the county at large, we shall find that its western 

 and larger portion is drained by several small streams, which com- 

 bine to form the Ivel, and "move slowly together to Biglesivade, 

 thence to Temsford, and there are united to the great Oivse,'"'^' a 

 short distance below Bedford. The drainage of the other and 

 smaller portion of this division, from Ashwell to Eoyston, is 

 received by the feeders of the Cam, the principal of which, the 

 Rhee,f "comes from a Source of Springs, which spin from small 

 Veins out of a Eock of stone, on the East side of Ashwell^ and 

 joyning together in the space of two Furlongs, make a Torrent 

 that drives a Mill, and on the sudden swells to a fair Eiver, and 

 overtaking the Cam leadeth to Cambridge,'''' % and is soon after- 



* Chaimcy, Hist. Antiq. Herts, pp. 2, 3. 



t The names Rliee or Rhe, and Cam, seem to be applied indifferently to the 

 Ashwell and Quendon streams, the two principal of those which unite to form 

 the Graunt, as the Cambridge river is perhaps most properly called. The name 

 Rhee is also, I believe, sometimes given locally to the stream which rises at 

 Baldock, which is generally supposed to be the true Ivel. The words are said 

 to mean in the Celtic respectively " swift" (Rhe) and " crooked or meandering " 

 (Cam). If any weight is to be attached to this etymology, the Ashwell stream 

 should be the true Cam. Cf. Babington, ' Flora of Cambridgeshire,' p. rxii. 



X Chauncy, I.e. 



VOL. I. — PT. III. 5 



