69 



communis), the Herb-Paris (Paris quadrifolia), the wild Hyacinth (Hyacinthug 

 non-scriptiis), and Lemna gibba and Lemna minor among the duckweeds. 

 The ferns of the district are the common Hartstongue (Scolopendrium vulgare), 

 growing in a hedge near Lyonshall ; the common Polypody, growing every- 

 where ; the prickly Shieldfem (Aspidium aculeatum), the male Shieldfern 

 (Aspidium FiUa-mas), the hard Blechnum (B. boreale or Spicant), growing 

 profusely in Lyonshall-park ; the common Moonwort (Botrj'chium Liinaria), 

 the Bracken (Pteris aquilina), Asplenium Trichomanes, A. Adiantimi nigrum, 

 and A. Ruta-muraria, and Polystichum angtdare. 



I have before alluded to the frequency of monstrosities or sports among 

 many of the common hedgerow plants, and more particularly have I noticed 

 these among primroses. You can seldom or ever pick a handful of primroses 

 without getting three or four specimens that have sported ; either the 

 calyx has foliage leaves instead of the ordinary sepals or we have inside the 

 tube of the coroUa a second tubular coroUa growing out of the first one replacing 

 the pistil. Sometimes these double and treble varieties have still inside the 

 innermost corolla the proper complement of stamens and pistils. I possess as 

 many as 20 different sports of the primrose, all from perfectly wild localities. 

 Again this is true of the common buttercups especially Ranunculus Ficaria 

 hereabouts, continually in definite stamens, half petals half stamens occur, and 

 similarly a gradual shading off from sepals into petals is often noticed. These 

 are only instances of a common phenomenon, which, however, has considerable 

 interest as supporting the idea — theory shall I call it — that foliage leaves, sepals, 

 petals, stamens and pistil are all alike forms and developments of a typical 

 leaf-form ; and that they are therefore easQy interchangeable. Such is the 

 very rational theory founded on the observation of, and to explain facts like 

 these above mentioned. I found this year a very good illustration of this 

 theory in a monstrous specimen of wild mustard picked in a turnip field, half- 

 way up the root-stem of the plant the stem thickened to double its size, above 

 the thickening came out foliage leaves arranged like the sepals of a crucifer ; 

 inside them were four thick green leaves more than inch and a half long and an 

 inch broad, arranged also as a crucifer, but bearing no resemblance to petals 

 except when one looked at the inside where just at the base was a little yellow 

 strip up the inside for about a quarter of the length of the monstrous petal ; 

 the stamens were six in number inside the petals, but two of them were half 

 developed as foliage leaves, and inside them in the place of the pistil came the 

 .continuation of the stem bearing more flowers of the ordinary kind. This 

 theory, which I have seldom seen mentioned in text-books or botany, I have 

 found of great use in explaining to students the nature and relation of the 

 calyx corolla, &o., side by side with that of foliage leaves. 



An interesting sport occurred iu our garden on a labm-num tree. On the 

 same tree were growing the yellow and violet varieties, but oddly enough, one 

 of the shoots about 7 inches long, bears only sessile violet flowers and leaves 

 instei-d of the ordinary drooping bunches ; the flowers are placed along this 



