SHORT NOTES. 



247 



Ceeastium pumilum, Curt., in Sukrey — For some years past I 

 have searched the neighbourhood of Croydon for this plant — 

 Dickson s habitat, "dry banks about Croydon," being no guide to 

 any special locality. I have examined many hundreds of speci- 

 mens of C'erastia without success, until one day last June, passing 

 over Banstead Downs, near Epsom, my attention was called to a 

 Cerastium growing with Viola hirta var. calcarea, Alsme tenuifoUa, &g., 

 which, after carefully examining, I came to the conclusion was 

 either C. jmmilum or something that had not been described as 

 British. To make sure I sent a specimen to Dr. Boswell, who 

 replied, "Your plant cannot well be anything else than pumilum; 

 in fact it is nearer the figure in Curt. Fl. Lond. of Dickson's 

 Croydon plant than the Isle of Wight plant in E. B." Curtis' s 

 plant seems very distinct, but many others are referred to it that 

 certainly cannot belong. The so-called ''pumilum'' from Lowestoft 

 Denes (Mr. Linton !) and somewhat similar specimens from Felix- 

 stowe (Dr. Huid !) do not seem to me to belong to C. j^umilimi at 

 all. May it not be doubted whether true pumilwn has ever been 

 found in sand? In Norfolk and Suffolk, on the sandy "brecks" 

 of the drift, I have repeatedly searched for any Cerastium like 

 pitmihim, but without success. The continental plants I i)Ossess 

 named ''pumilum'' are not the plant of Curtis. — Arthur Bennett. 



Carduus lanceolato-palustris in South Hants. — In June last 

 I observed at Brockenhurst, between the town and tlie station, a 

 remarkable thistle growing by a ditch on the east side of the road, 

 with Carduus palustris, C. lanceolatus, and C. arvensis. On ex- 

 amination there seems little doubt that it is a hybrid between 

 palustris and lanceolatus, the closely aggregated anthodes of small 

 size and dark jpurple colour being almost typically jjalustris ; the 

 nearly naked stem and leaves lanceolate in outline, but with 

 narrower lobes, the terminal lobe being very long and strongly 

 spined being as suggestive of lanceolatus ; it may be briefly cha- 

 racterised as laiiceolatus with the anthodes of palustris. The jplant 

 with fully open flowers was under two feet in height. — G. C.Druce. 



Medicago minima, Lam., in Sussex. — Another interesting 

 addition has been lately made to the list of Sussex plants by 

 the discovery, last month, of Medicago minima by the Kev. E.N. 

 Blomfield, on Camber Sands, near Kye, East Sussex, where it was 

 growing in company with another rare Sussex plant, Trifolium 

 sujf'ocatum. The latter was, according to Mr. Hemsley's list, 

 previously known to occur only on the Castle Hill, Hastings, and 

 at Littlehampton. Both these plants occurred in considerable 

 abundance in the sandy turf towards the Preventive Station, nearly 

 at the south extremity of the sands. — F. C. S. Eoper. 



Variety of Ophrys apifera. — A singular form of Ophrijs apifera 

 was gathered in July last by Mrs. Pattinson, at Seaton, South 

 Devon. Two plants were found on some waste ground near an old 

 quarry, both bearing flowers of the same abnormal type, while in 

 company with several of the ordinary form. The labellum was 



