306 THE JOUHNAL OF BOTANY 



diao-nosls, for in some specimens we have seen of typical B. vulgaris 

 the lateral lobes have remained small and undeveloped. 



We think it just possible that Mr. Marshall is right in considering 

 that the figure given by S^mie for B. sfricta is really B. rivularis, 

 i. e., B. vulgaris var. silvestris. The matter was not mentioned in 

 the previous paper because we could not decide that there was suffi- 

 cient on the plate to determine which of the two it was better placed 

 under, and we are still undecided. There is little in the text to show 

 that Syme either knew or was able to discriminate between the two 

 plants. Both grow in Yorkshire, which Syme especially mentions, 

 and he may have confused them as so many others have done. 



NOTES ON BEDFOEDSHIKE PLANTS. 

 Br J. E. Little, M.A. 



The Flora of Bedfordshire has during the present century 

 received attention in three publications. The Victoria County His- 

 tory of Beds (i. pp. 37-67 ; Constable, 190^) deals with the Botany 

 of "^the county generally in articles by J. Hamson and G. C. Druce, 

 assisted by James Saunders and E. M. Holmes. In 1906 Mr. J. 

 Hamson published Aii Account of the Flora of Bedfordshire (Beds 

 Times Publishing Co., Bedford), and Mr. James Saunders gathered 

 too-ether various contributions which he had ])reviously made in 

 The Field Flowers of Bedfordshire (W. F. Bunker, Luton, 1911). 



The following paper presents a selection of records supplementary 

 to the last-mentioned. Mr. AV. Hillhouse, in the Transactions of the 

 Beds Natural History Society (F. Thompson & Son, High St., 

 Bedford), proposed in his paper " On the Surface Geology and 

 Physical Geography of Beds " (pp. 83-91) that the county should 

 be subdivided according to its main geological features into two 

 districts, a northern (chiefly clay) and a southern (chiefl^^ cretaceous), 

 the former being cut up into four, and the latter into three sub- 

 districts, and each of the .sub-districts being again parcelled into 

 seven portions. Thus in fact forty-nine divisions Avere proposed, a 

 number wholly unworkable on any extended scale, and undesirable 

 for so small a county. The Victoria County History, passing over 

 this propo.sal.of Mr. Hillhouse, takes the river-basins as its starting- 

 point, and makes the following divisions: — 1. Nene ; 2. East Ouse ; 

 3. West Ouse ; 4. Ivel ; 5. Cam ; 6. Ouzel ; 7. Lea. Of these 

 basins the areas draining into the Nene and the Cam are so small 

 that for practical purposes they may be merged with their neigh- 

 bours, Nene with West Ouse, and Cam with Ivel. This leaves 

 five divisions, possibly in the estimation of some a number still too 

 large. The records subjoined all fall under Mr. Hillhouse's Southern 

 and under Mr. Druce's Ivel Division. Some parts of the Ivel Basin 

 are more easily accessible from Hitchin than from either Luton or 

 Bedford. Tlie Rev. Chas. Abbot in his Flora Bedfordiensis (1798) 

 mentions foi- this disti-ict a number of plants in the neighbourhood of 

 Potton whieii recent search has failed to re-discover — at least, no 



