63 LOCAL NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETIES. 



their efforts on some particular subject, instead of rambling 

 discursively and comparatively uselessly over several, we 

 must at the same time add a word of caution, and bid our 

 friends not to lay undue stress on such points as those indi- 

 cated by Mr. Gulliver's lecture. We began with the East 

 Kent Society ; we will now venture to urge upon its members 

 the desirability of preparing a flora of their district, with 

 special reference to the soils and geological features of the 

 county. Few counties are more favourably situated for this 

 purpose than Kent, from the great variety of conditions 

 under which plants grow. The coast line from Margate to 

 Dungeness, so interesting geologically, is hardly less so 

 when considered with relation to the plants growing on its 

 different strata. In some parts, as near Folkestone for 

 instance, it is possible, so to speak, to have immediately on 

 the left hand the flora of one district (gault), on the right 

 that of the chalk, so sharply is the line drawn in some places. 

 The lessons to be learnt by the Naturalist in the district we 

 have indicated ought not to be thrown away upon the agricul- 

 turist or the gardener. They must be obtuse indeed who 

 cannot get some hints which may be turned to profitable 

 account in the field or the garden. Our East Kent friends 

 might well take as a model the flora of Northumberland and 

 Durham, lately issued by the Tyneside Naturalists' Club, and 

 in which the distribution of wild plants according to soil, 

 elevation, and other climatic conditions, is entered upon at 

 considerable length, while the corresponding relations in the 

 case of plants cultivated by the farmer and gardener are not 

 overlooked. It is a rare thing now to find a " new " plant in 

 our well-explored English counties, and if such be found the 

 gain is not generally great, either in a scientific or practical 

 point of view. On the other hand, the careful study of the 

 relation between the plants and the conditions under which 

 they grow, the possible range of variation in any given 

 plants, and the inducing causes of those variations open up 

 a field as interesting as it is promising in important results, 

 both in a scientific and in a practical point of view. No 

 persons are more favourably situated for the accomplishment 

 of useful service in this direction, than the members of our 

 local Field Clubs." 

 The foregoing observations show how much may be done 



