52 SHORT NOTES AND QUERIES. 



vulgare, Pers.), after the grain lias been detached. (The axes of the female 

 spikes of another grass, Zea Mays, L., are sold in London under the name 

 of "French firelights," at the rate of twelve a penny). Fine hand- 

 brushes for clothes are said to be made in Italy from the long fibrous 

 roots (rhizomes) of a grass, Andropogon T&climnum, L. (Jury's Eeport 

 Internat. Exh. 1862, Class 4, C, p. 19). A similar product of another 

 species, A. muricatmn, is the well-known khus-khus or veti-vert of per- 

 fumers. In the West of France I have seen brooms for sale made of the 

 haulm of a species of Cameliua, — a way, no doubt, of working up a waste 

 product in the cultivation of an oil-plant. Finally, I learnt at Round- 

 stone in Connemara that the beautiful Erica hihernica, Syme, locally 

 known as French Heath, is found, from its miniature tree-like growth, to 

 make capital brooms. — W. T. Thiselton Dyer. 



Perthshire Plants. — In the report of the December meeting of the 

 Edinburgh Botanical Society (p. 26), Dr. Dickson and Wx. Sadler are 

 recorded to have found (Eiia)dhe pimpinelloldes and Pinipindla magna in 

 Perthshire. By the kindness of the latter botanist I have been favoured 

 with specimens of both plants. He says that they grew near Hamilton 

 House, in meadow-ground by the side of a burn, in comi)any with P. 

 Saxifraga and Bntiium flexuosum. Mr. Sadler adds that he first collected 

 P. magna i\\e.rtm 18. 5 8 and believes it had been previously observed; 

 he considers both plants to be " truly wild." Mr. Watson, who has seen 

 specimens from Perthshire collected by Dr. Dewar, brackets province 15 

 {vide ' Compendiun),' p. 190), intimating a suspicion of the species having 

 been introduced there. Whatever may be the real state of the case as 

 regards this species, which certainly occurs in Yorkshire and Durham 

 ('Comp.' 1. c.),any grounds of suspicion with regard to it must hold with still 

 greater force in tlie case of (E. piiripinelloides, a plant restricted to South 

 England (north limit, Worcester and Sufl:'olk, ' Comp.' p. 192), and with a 

 strong bias for low coast districts. An outlying station so distant from 

 the main area of the species must remain under a suspicion of introduction 

 by human agency, at all events till some approach towards a bridge over 

 the gap is made by the discovery of intermediate localities.* It is to be 

 wished that some of the many local botanists of Scotland would carefully 

 and impartially investigate the rather numerous cases where more or less 

 of doubt rests upon the real nativity of species in the northern portion of 

 Great Britain. The addition of a species to the flora of any district is of 

 no greater scientific importance than the exclusion of one by the demon- 

 stration of a fallacy in its claims to nativity. Mr. Watson has done 

 excellent service, if he has applied his tests rigorously, in admitting into 

 his summaries no alleged facts which will not bear a thorough scrutiny. 

 The form of Pimpinella magna sent to me by Mr. Sadler is one with the 

 leaflets cut into linear segments, of which I have also seen specimens from 

 Kent and Hertfordshire; it has a very different aspect to the normal 

 form, and was distinguished by Morison (Hist. Oxon. vol. iii. p. 284) 

 and J. Sherard (Ray, Syn. ed. iii. p. 213), but has dropped out of 



* Since this was written I have seen in the ' Scottish Naturalist ' (p. '24) a 

 remark by Mr. Dawson that "a number of curious plants growing near Hamilton 

 House" were " probably introduced by the late Mr. Buchanan Hamilton." This 

 may be considei'ed strong additional ground for distrust, and to turn the scale 

 against the claim of CE. pimpinelloichs. 



