428 CHARLES CARDALE BABINGTON. [1890 



or Focke will give us one. On the next page I give a copy of my 

 notes on your false incurvatus. Shall we call it Dumnoniensis ? or 

 will Focke give it a name ? Please to criticise my description fully. 

 I will write further about anglo-saxonicus, but you may like to have 

 this now. — Yours very truly, Charles C. Babington. 



To Rev. E. S. Marshall. 



Cambridge, Jan. 31, 1890. 



Dear Mr. Marshall, — I am exceedingly sorry. I thought that 1 

 had sent a post card to acknowledge the receipt of your very valuable 

 parcel. But it appears that I neglected to do so. Pray pardon me. 

 I have been so much occupied since it came that I have not been able 

 to examine its contents. It shall be done very soon, as I much 

 desire to do so. I will look to the Saxifraga which is at the 

 Botanical Garden. Although S. caespitosa is very valuable, S. groen- 

 landica will be quite as much so. I hope the root is doing well, 

 Mr. Lynch thought it would, and then we shall probably have 

 flowers on it in the summer. Hooker in his " Fl. Bor. Amer." i. 244 

 places it as a synonym of S. caespitosa. De Candolle (" Prod." IV. 27) 

 keeps it distinct, and says that it grows in the Pyrenees. He says, 

 " dense caespitosa viscosa, foliis densissime imbricatis pubescentibus 

 viscidis cuneatis apice profunde 3-5-lobis, lobis obtusis {note this), 

 scapo subaphyllo, floribus capitatis, petalis obovatis albis venis pallide 

 purpureis calyce multo longioribus, filamentis staminum purpureis, 

 stylis post anthesin valde divaricatis." He gives this as that of 

 Lapeyrouse. It is given as a distinct species in the " Fl. de France " 

 I. 649, where there is a long description of the Pyrenean plant. 

 It is also said there that the 



To T. R. Archer Briggs, Esq. 



Cambridge, Feb. 3, 1890. 



Dear Mr. Briggs, — I do not know what you will say to me,, 

 for I am placing B. Boi'eanus under R. vestitus {B. leucostachys Sm.), 

 for I cannot distinguish our plants which I have under those 

 names. We know very little concerning our supposed B. Boreanus.. 

 Grenevier, who ought to know, was very doubtful about them. 

 There is no doubt that some states of vestitus do approach the 

 spectabiles. I always had a hankering after Swainson's mode of 

 classification (he applied it to birds) of a series of circles touching 

 each other on all sides. But I believe it is quite thrown aside 

 now as untenable. Certainly a linear arrangement is very bad ; 

 but what else can we do ? I have a specimen before me which 

 seems to be what Bloxam called Warrenii in 1873. F. M. Webb 

 gathered it (and Bloxam authenticated it) by Knutsford Moor, 

 Cheshire. I have it from you as not specified (?) from between 



