2 ALIEN FLORA OF BRITAIN 



been grown in gardens from the earliest times, and it must 

 have been familiar to the older botanists, yet there is no 

 record of it as a wild plant until about ninety years ago. 

 The geographical range of the species extends to Nor- 

 mandy, but there are two forms in Western Europe, and 

 the one which reaches furthest north as an undoubted 

 native is not the form found in England. The British 

 form is identical with that of the mountains of Southern 

 Europe, whence it was perhaps originally introduced into 

 our gardens. 



[Actea spicata, L. There can be no question that this 

 widely spread North European species is a native. The 

 early records, it is true, look suspicious, both Ray and 

 Gerarde knowing of it only near houses and parks. It was 

 not, however, a cultivated plant, at any rate at that time, 

 and the unanimity of later writers as to its status as a 

 native in Yorkshire and Westmoreland leaves no choice 

 in the matter.] 



[Adonis aestivalis, L. Recorded by Withering, from 

 Salisbury Plain. The plants, however, which Smith saw 

 from this locality were A. auiumnalis, L.] 



Adonis autumnalis, L. A cornfield weed of old 

 standing in Britain as in most parts of the Continent. 

 The species is most abundant in the east of Europe, and 

 may perhaps be indigenous there. It is a frequent con- 

 stituent of colonies of weeds in England arising from the 

 sittings of Eastern corn. 



Adonis flammea, J acq. A cornfield weed of the 

 Orient which has occurred in places where sittings of 

 barley from that region have been thrown. 



