EUPHRASIA SALISBURGENSIS FUNK., IN IRELAND, 197 



Lough Mask, Co. Mayo, in July, 1895. The Lough Mask plant, as 

 figured by Mr. Townsend in the plate which adds so much to the 

 value of his paper, is obviously far from typical, but from a note in 

 last month's issue of the Journal of liotany it appears that Messrs. 

 H. and J. Groves have discovered amongst material collected in 

 1892 near Menlough, in Co. Galway, specimens which Mr. Town- 

 send considers much closer to the continental plant. An elegant, 

 slender-stemmed Euphrasia, gathered by myself in August, 1895, 

 near Ballyvaughan, Co. Clare, where it grows in abundance on 

 limestone crags, has since been kindly examined by Mr. Townsend, 

 who unhesitatingly refers it to E. tialishxuyensis, and informs me 

 that it is similar to the Menlough plant. 



This interesting Euphrasia is thus shown to range over a con- 

 siderable area on the low-lying limestone tracts of West Ireland ; 

 but it cannot justly be regarded as a recent addition to our flora. 

 The plant, in fact, was gathered in Ireland so long ago as 1852, 

 and was recorded as Irish, under another name, in the Cybele 

 Hibernica in 1866. We find it first referred to in the following 

 passage from a paper by Daniel Oliver published in the Phytuloyist 

 for 1854, and describing a botanical tour made in Ireland two years 

 earlier : — 



"■Euphrasia ? On Aran I collected a curious little form, some 



three inches in height, much branched from the base ; stem with a minute, 

 aclpressed pubescence ; lanceolate or lanceolate-oblong leaves, with one, 

 two, or three strong teeth on each side. I did not know to what species 

 or form to refer it; but, examples being sent to C. C. Babington, he kindly 

 informs me that he thinks it a form of the E. gracilis of Fries, although 

 it strikingly resembles, and possibly may be, E. Salishurgensis .'"'■'•■ 



Two years later, in the Scottish Gardener for 1856, the same 

 plant, this time under the name E. (jracilis Fries, was recorded by 

 the late Mr. A. G. More from the limestone district of Castle Taylor 

 and Garryland, Co. Galway. The finder, however, appears to have 

 been dissatisfied with the naming of his plant, for four years later, 

 in his paper "Localities for some Plants observed in Ireland,"! we 

 find this further reference to it : — 



^^ Euphrasia gracilis seems to belong rather to E. Salishurgcnsis ; in 

 either case it is the E. ncmorosa of Grenier and Godron. But the Garry- 

 land (and Aran) Euphrasia differs much from what I have gathered as 

 E. gracilis on the heaths and downs of Kent. This latter is apparently the 

 E. ericetorum of Jordan; but I do not suppose that either is specifically 

 distinct." 



It appears clearly, from More's correspondence about tliis time 

 with his friends the Rev. W. W. Newbould and Professor Babington, 

 that he was strongly inclined to refer his Castle Taylor plant to 

 E. Salisburgensis, and that he refrained from adopting that name 

 only in deference to the opinion of the distinguished author of the 

 Manual of British Botauij. Through the knidness of Miss More 

 I am enabled to make the following interesting extracts from her 

 brother's correspondence in illustration of this point. The MS. 



* Vol. iv. p. 679. t :sat. Hist. Reviciv, vii. p. 434. 



