369 



ON THE THAMES-SIDE BEASSICA. 

 By Hewett C. "Watson. 



In the ' Journal of Botany ' for December, 1869 (A^ol. VII. p. 346), 

 I endeavoured to show that this plant is the wild or semi-wild state 

 of the common Turnip, and neither Swede nor Rape. Having this 

 year, 1870, dried numerous examples of it for distribution through 

 the Exchange Club, I ask permission to add some supplementary 

 notes on it ; this time directing attention to the distinctive characters 

 of the plant itself, rather than to a correction of the misnomers of it in 

 books. My examples have been selected in order to illustrate three 

 successive stages in growth, and an account of these three states wall 

 most readily explain the peculiar characters of the plant, and prove its 

 true affinities. 



1. The autumn and winter state : — These specimens are the young 

 plants produced from seeds shed naturally in the late summer or early 

 autumn months immediately preceding. Their leaves are hispid and 

 green, not at all glaucous, and they constitute a loose crown of radical 

 leaves, not produced into a stem. This state continues through the 

 winter into the following spring ; the very earliest leaves gradually 

 decaying away. 



2. The spring state : — Earlier or later, varying with the character 

 of the season, the rough green leaves of autumn and winter are suc- 

 ceeded by others which differ from them in being nearly glabrous and 

 somcAvhat glaucous. These are the proper stem-leaves ; but the change 

 comes so gradually that it is not always easy to decide where the 

 rough green root or crown leaves cease and the smooth glaucous stem- 

 leaves begin ; some of them showing an intermediate or transition 

 character, neither quite glabrous nor quite glaucous. 



3. The summer state : — This is the flowering stage, when the rough 

 green root-leaves have all disappeared, usually before a single flower of 

 the corymb is open ; and the more weakly plants often lose also their 

 lower stem-leaves before the flowers are open. The upper stem-leaves 

 are now smooth, almost entire, and more decidedly glaucous ; still, 

 not so truly glaucous as those of the Swede or most varieties of the 

 Cabbage. 



VOL. VIII. [DECEMBER 1^ 1870.] 2 D 



