HISTORY OK ESSEX BOTANY. 235 



duas tresve spicas alternas quasi fissili, unam praecipue partem 

 spectante D. Buddie." The plant, being abundant enough, has 

 naturally been observed in the district by subsequent botanists 

 such as Edward Forster, the Rev. Thomas Benson, many years 

 vicar of Fambridge, Dr. Varenne, between 1867 and 1873, ^^^'^ 

 the present writer in iSgo. 



p. 70. " Lathy rus pcrennis siliqua hirsuta. At Hadly Castle two miles from 

 Lee in Essex." [Lathyrus hirsutus L.] 



This is the first record of one of the most exclusively South 

 Essex species. Ray recorded it, having looked up its continental 

 synonymy, in the first edition of his Catalogus Plantartnn Anglm 

 (1670), p. 190, as from Hockley, Raleigh, and Rochford Hundred, 

 and Dale reported it from Dengey Hundred ; nor is there any 

 reason to doubt that it was once more widely spread, though not 

 recorded from Nazing until 1836. In spite of cultivation it holds 

 its own in several localities, including the earliest recorded, where 

 Gibson collected it in 1834, Babington in 1835, Syme in i860, 

 and Messrs. E. A. Fitch and W. Cole in i88g, and Latchingdon, 

 where it has been been known as abundant since 1850. There 

 is an excellent coloured plate of this species in Gibson's Flora. 



p. 94. " Pisitm aliud mayititnniu Byittanicum, P. 1060. G. 1250. On 

 Essex shores." [Lathyrus maritimus Bigel.] 



Though nowhere else recorded from Essex, this species may 

 have occurred in the county, since Ray mentions it from both 

 Hastings (Sussex) and Suffolk, and it is credited to Kent from 

 Qa.raden'' % Britannia (1586) to Watson's Typographical Botany (1873). 

 Its chief interest, however, centres round its occurrence, as Ray 

 expresses it, " On the long baich of Stones runnmg from Aldburgh 

 towards Orford in Suffolk," where it saved the inhabitants from 

 famine in 1555. This was first mentioned in the letters of Dr. 

 John Caius (1510-1573) to Conrad Gesner, and published by the 

 latter in De Aquatilibiis, lib. 4, p. 256, and was afterwards narrated 

 by Stow in his Chronicle (1580). 



p. 96. " Polygonum marinum. Near Lewis in Essex." 



Whatever the locality may mean, this record is at least 

 equally obscure botanically. It is not likely to refer to Polygonum 

 maritimum L., which belongs to the south-west of England ; but 

 may be P. Raii Bab., which has been doubtfully recorded for 



