Bilberry and Heather 215 
massed together in large racemes, comprising from 
thirty to sixty more or less erect pink flowers. This 
species 1s of more restricted range than the Fringed 
Heath, being confined to the Lizard district in 
Cornwall, and one or two other localities still 
farther west. 
Our remaining species, the Irish Heath (2. medi- 
terranea), 1s still more local, being in fact regarded 
as a native of these islands by reason only of its 
foothold in Mayo and Galway. This, which is a 
taller-growing species, has a pink corolla of a form 
half-way between the egg-shape of Cross-leaved 
Heath and the bell-shape of Cornish Heath. | 
These Heaths tell an important story, a botanical 
romance that supports the conclusions of the geolo- 
gist, and also revives the old legends of Atlantis and 
Lyonesse, the submerged lands of the Atlantic. The 
story 1s too long to be properly told here, but I may 
briefly say that Plato described Atlantis as an island 
over 3000 miles long by 250 miles wide, in the western 
ocean, opposite the Straits of Gibraltar; whilst old 
chroniclers speak of a land called Lyonesse which 
connected Land’s End with Scilly. Well, geology 
and botany show that such a land once existed where 
now are the Azores, connecting not merely Cornwall 
with the adjacent archipelago, but also with Ireland 
and the Spanish Peninsula. These Heaths are all 
found in Spain, and those that are so rare and 
restricted in range in England and Ireland are very 
common there, with other species not found here at 
all; and looking at all the facts of their distribution, 
which cannot be gone into here, it is concluded that 
this submerged land was the original home of the 
