FLORA OF BARRA AND SODTH UIST. 33 



On the northern exposure of the Doirlinn promon- 

 tory, the Vernal Squill (Scilla verna, Huds.), referred 

 to last year, was in plenty at the edges of the 

 heather. 



On grass-grown sand-hills swept by the winds, and 

 where everything green was in a more or less 

 dwarfed condition, Viola Curtisii, Forst., bloomed at 

 our feet; while here and there was to be seen a 

 peculiar stunted form of GaUnvi verum, L., i:)resenting 

 the appearance of a small juniper plant. This form 

 Mr. Bennett tells me he has also seen on the sand- 

 hills of Norfolk. 



Between Barra and South Uist lies the island of 

 Eriskay, three miles in length, the inhabitants of 

 Avhich, a few years ago, suffered so severely from an 

 epidemic of measles. On this island there grows a 

 plant with some interest attaching to it. Miss C. 

 F. Gordon Gumming, the well-known aiithoress, 

 refers to it at page 305 in her book. In the Hebrides, 

 in the following words : " For those who love wild 

 flowers these islands offer various treasvires. For 

 instance, in the rocky Isle of Eriskay, in Barra Sound, 

 a lovely blue flower, something like a Convolvulus, 

 with waxy leaf, blooms in July and August. As it 

 is unknown elsewhere the people account for its 

 presence by saying that Prince Charlie brought 

 some seeds from Normandy and sowed them here in 

 some idle moment in those summer days which he 

 spent here, when, in July, 1745, he arrived with one 

 small frigate of sixteen guns, with a little handful 

 of faithful adherents, to reclaim the crown of 

 Britain." Through the courtesy of Mr. Malcolm 

 Macleod, whom I met on his way to Eriskay, I was 

 favoured with fresh specimens of this j^lant, which 

 proved to be Calystegia Soldanella, R.Br., not i^reviously 

 recorded from the Vice-County, and which does not 

 seem to have come under the notice of Professors 

 Balfour and Babington in their visit to the Hebrides 

 in 1841. The circumstance of the plant growing on 

 this little island, "while an examination of the 



