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imbibing some portion of the fervour and enthusiasm of the 
naturalist, at the same time that they derive benefit from the new 
sources of pleasure and interest opened up to them. 
The last meeting of the Club for the season, tuok place at 
Cirencester, on Wednesday, 14th of September. The President 
was absent through ill-health, and is indebted to Professor Buck- 
man for the report which follows :— 
The Club met at the “ Fleece Inn,” Cirencester, but in conse- 
quence of the threatening aspect of the weather, few members 
were present. After breakfast, Messrs. Stronge and Bowly took 
the party assembled, in their carriages, to the old Church of 
St. Mary, Ashbrook, where the Norman tympanum of the north 
door, and a west window with peculiar flamboyant tracery, at- 
tracted great attention. Maiseyhampton Church was next visited, 
where the decorated east window, the sedilia and fine architec- 
tural morceaux of the early English period, much interested the 
ecclesiologists. In the Churchyard, under the south wall, were 
pointed out some specimens of the Elder-tree (Sambucus nigra), 
much sought after by the country-folks, for virtues supposed to 
exist in them, as set forth in Mr. Jones’s paper upon “ Certain 
superstitions prevalent in the vale of Gloucester,” which was read 
to the Cotteswold Club at their meeting at Tewkesbury, in 1854. 
Poulton Church was next examined, the east window of which 
deserves attention. It is an early English 3-light window, plain 
outside, but with an elegant cinque-foiled hood, internally sup- 
ported by semi-columns resting upon corbel-heads. A fine 
Section of the “Great Oolite” and “ Forest Marble” was here 
examined, and explained by Professor Buckman. 
After dinner Professor Buckman exhibited some fossil reptilian 
eggs found in the Great Oolite near Cirencester; and in the 
absence of papers gave a lecture upon the growth of Carduus 
arvensis, or Field Thistle, setting at rest the disputed point as to 
whether Thistles grow by seed, by exhibiting a potin which 
eight seeds had come up out of ten sown. This furnishes us 
with some interesting facts in illustration of the history of thistle 
growth. It is known that these plants spread themselves below 
the surface by means of Rhizomata (underground stems), after 
the fashion of Couch-grass ; and the knowledge of this fact has 
given rise to the widely disseminated impression that Thistles do 
not grow from seed. But this experiment of Professor Buckman 
shews that the seeds readily germinate ; and such seeds being 
of the pappiform kind, and each flower producing about 150, 
while each plant on an average produces 20 flowers, it will readily 
be seen at what a frightful rate of increase this plant possesses 
the faculty of propagating itself—150x 20=3000 for a single 
plant, which if grown on a waste place may readily distribute 
seeds over an eutire farm. 
It will not be out of place here to notice the valuable results 
