196 CONVALLARIA. 



life to their search ; and his love was rewarded by many discoveries. 

 He travelled, at the sole expense of Dr. Merrett, for five successive 

 summers, through various parts of Britain ; and, in one of these 

 simpling journeys, he found the Convallaria under notice " growing 

 on the ledges of the scars or cliffs near "VMierf and Settle in York- 

 shire." This was pubhshed in 16G7. In 1671 the good old man 

 was John Ray's guide to the station, and the visit of the latter makes 

 the spot classic to the British botanist. " Nos in rupibus et petrarum 

 fissuris invenimus in Angha non longe a Settle Eboracensis provincise 

 oppido," says Ray in his Historia Plantarum, i. p. 665 ; but in his 

 " Synopsis," p. 148, he omits his personal visit, and allows the 

 habitat to stand on WilUsel's single authority. 



The facetious Jacob Bobart, superintendent of the Botanicals 

 Garden at Oxford (Pulteney's Sketches, i. p. 313), was the second 

 person to find our plant indigenous " in the woods on the north side 

 of Mendip hills," Somersetshire. This station was published by Ray 

 in 1677. 



A long interval elapsed — and then a habitat nigh to the original 

 one was added by Mr. Caley in a " rocky part of Sykes' wood, near 

 Ingleton, Yorkshire." Caley was, I believe, a botanist of like station 

 and tastes as Willisel, and employed as a collector by Dr. Withering 

 of Birmingham, in whose " Botanical Arrangement " the habitat was 

 published in 1796, and probably in 1787, — the date of the 2iid edi- 

 tion of his excellent and well-known work. 



The Convallaria is figured in the 4th volume of " English Botany," 

 pi. 280, from a specimen " gathered by Mr. J. Rayer in Kent." 

 This volume was pubhshed in 1795 ; and in the " Flora Britannica," 

 published in 1800, Sir James E. Smith informs us that the species 

 had been found by Mr. Wigg near Yarmouth. In the " English 

 Flora" we were informed that this latter station was given in error ; 

 and, in the same great work, we find the habitats in Kent particu- 

 larized by Mr. Graves, \iz. "woods near Bexley and Dartford." I 

 very much doubt if the plant can be considered indigenous there, — 

 the authority is not altogether without suspicion, — and the figure in 

 " English Botany" represents a much larger and more luxuriant plant 

 than suits the Convallaria to assume in its native site on the face of 

 cliffs *. 



It was in the "English Flora" (1824) that we were apprised of 

 the plant being a native of our district, in which it was first of all 

 discovered by Mr. Arthur Bruce on " Kyloe rocks, a few miles south 

 of Berwick." The date of the disco verj^ I cannot ascertain, but it 

 must have been long previous to its publication. And there it grew 

 unseen again, and careless of its wasted beauty, until June 1848, 

 when the shy thing discovered itself, on the same day, to four mem- 

 bers of our Club. These were Messrs. Broderick and Selby, Em- 



* These notes on Convallaria polygonatum were written before the pub- 

 lication of Mr. Watson's Cybele Britannica, or Dr. Bromfield's Flora of 

 Hampshire ( Phytologist, 1850, p. 960); but by reference to them the 

 reader will find that recent habitats assigned for this plant are very sus- 

 picious. 



