380 STACHYS ALPINA L. IN BKITAlN. 



lip insignificant, 8 mm. long, narrowing upwards from nearly 

 5 mm. at the base to 1-5 mm. below the apex ; anterior lip spread- 

 ing, 1 cm. long, lobes 7 mm. long, the median 4-5 mm. broad, the 

 lateral scarcely 4 mm. Stamens -5 cm. long, incliuling the anther- 

 cells (3 mm.), which are parallel, but not quite on the same level. 

 Style filiform, red, sparsely hairy at base, 22 mm. long. Ovary 

 pubescent, ovately oblong, 4 mm. long, girt by a short annular disc 

 at base. Fruit brown, 2 cm. long, lower third forming a narrow 

 stalk ; upper discoid, containing the brown flattened suborbicular 

 seeds (8 mm. long by 7 mm. broad), with indented hilum and 

 rugose surface. 



A striking plant, with the habit of /•-'. Linneanum Kurz, from 

 which, however, it is at once distinguished by its minute bracts. 



The collection also contains specimens of Asystasia Colete Eolfe, 

 from Wagga Mountains and Upper Sheik, which was described 

 from plants collected in Somali-land by Mrs. Phillips and Miss 

 Cole in 1895 ; and Ruellia discifolia Oliver (from Sok Soda and 

 Wagga Mountains), discovered by Messrs. James and Thrupp. 



STACHYS ALPINA L. IN BRITAIN. 

 By Cedkic Bucknall, Mus. Bac. Oxon. 



Within the last twenty years the botany of the district of the 

 Bristol coal-field has been well investigated, but that corner of it 

 into which the southern spurs of the Cotswold hills extend is com- 

 paratively unexplored, although it has enriched the local flora with 

 many good plants. On the 80th of June of this year I made an 

 excursion to a wooded hill near Wotton-under-Edge, the upper part 

 of which consists of upper lias sands capped with oolitic limestone, 

 and is between 600 and 700 ft. high. A part of the underwood had 

 been cut within the last year or two, and the ground was covered 

 with a luxuriant growth of different species of Hi/perkuw, Ettbiis, 

 LabiatcB, &c. Amongst the latter was a Stachi/s which I at once 

 recognized as difl'erent from any which I had seen in England, and on 

 examination and comparison it proved to be Stachys aJpina L., of 

 which I had gathered specimens last year in Switzerland. 



In the following week the locality was carefully examined by 

 Mr. J. W. White and myself. We found the plant to be thinly 

 scattered through the more open portions of the wood, and it 

 occurred also in thickets below the wood and by a roadside lower 

 down, on the lias sands ; the whole area as at present known 

 being less than a square mile. The plant has every appearance of 

 being native, but if this be so, it may appear strange that it should 

 hitherto have escaped notice. It must, however, be remembered 

 that the visits of botanists who would be likely to notice such a 

 plant being few and far between, and the coppice being probably 

 only cut at intervals of fifteen or twenty years, it would be a matter 

 of chance whether it was explored at a time when the plant could 



