8 NATURAL SCIENCE. July. 



methods of seed distribution. Their position does not call for any 

 special means of supporting themselves, and the supply of humus is 

 plentiful. Mycovhiza, which Loew found on many, was not observed 

 in the few examined. The size of many of the shrubs, e.g., Elder, 

 Ribcs, Rose, etc., was very remarkable; some elders were 3 inches 

 thick or more, and as much as 12 feet high. Experiments are in 

 progress upon the growth of plants in willow humus. 



Expeditious Scientific Research. 



Referring to Biology at Cambridge, we cannot refrain from 

 recording that at the meeting of the Zoological Society of London 

 on June 6, the exhibition of an egg of Ornithorhynchus was made the 

 occasion for some indignant remarks on the action of a member of 

 the University, in suppressing and rendering useless for the purposes 

 of science, materials collected at the public expense in the haunts of 

 Ornithoyhynchus and Ceyatodus in Australia. If Mr. W. H. Caldwell 

 is unable to make use of the specimens he was deputed to collect, it 

 is high time that he reported to that effect to the public institutions 

 that endowed his research ; and it would be well if in future the 

 Royal Society added some clause to the conditions on which the 

 Government grant is awarded, preventing any repetition of such 

 circumstances. As biologists, we are glad to learn that one of the 

 German Universities has undertaken the work of supplying us with 

 information concerning the early stages in the life-history of the duck- 

 bills and Ceratodus, and will shortly publish the preliminary results ; 

 as Britons, we cannot but regret that it should be necessary to depend 

 upon the resources of a foreign nation for the solution of some of the 

 most important problems in the Natural History of one of our own 

 colonies. 



WiLD-FLOWERS AND DROUGHT. 



In the Joimial of Botany for June, Mr. C. B. Clarke gives a few 

 notes on the effect of the warm, dry spring on our wild plants, " A 

 great number of annuals," says the writer, "usually regarded as 

 autumn annuals, have already run their course." On May 6 a 

 quantity of Valerianella olitoria was collected, not only in ripe fruit, 

 but with the whole plant whitened as seen in corn-fields after harvest. 

 The fruits contained abundance of perfect seeds ripe. On the same 

 day various banks in Surrey were seen to be golden-yellow with the 

 Mouse-ear Hawkweed [Hieyacium pilosella). Two other Hawkweeds, 

 {H. muvovum and H. sylvaticiim) were gathered in flower, the latter also 

 "off flower" within the next eight days; their normal flowering 

 season, according to the " Students' Flora," is July-September. 

 The Heath Erica tetvalix was almost as precocious, for a large 

 bundle was picked in full flower at Bournemouth on May 18. 

 Examples in full flower of nearly all the common autumnal weeds 



