ESSEX AND EARLY BOTANISTS 133 



fully about Braxted by the wayes-side," John Ray 

 noticed the same species. It is a rare plant with dull 

 purple flowers, and but seldom met with in Essex; 

 but until quite recently, and perhaps even now, a few 

 specimens might be found in their ancient habitat. 

 Another local plant which attracted the notice of Ray 

 "on the banks by the High-wayside, as you go up the 

 hill from Lexden to Colchester," was the smooth-tower 

 mustard, and one is glad to know that this very 

 uncommon plant is still occasionally seen in its old 

 locality. 



In Essex, as in many other parts of England, ferns 

 seem to have become scarcer of late years, far scarcer, 

 at any rate, than when Gerarde noticed the wall-rue 

 " upon the church-walls of Railey," and found the 

 adder's tongue " in the fields in Waltham Forest." 

 The noble royal or flowering-fern grew, he tells us, 

 " upon divers bogges on a heath or a common neere 

 unto Brentwood, especially neere unto a place there 

 that some have digged, to the end to finde a nest or 

 mine of gold, but the birds were over fledge and flowne 

 away before their wings could be clipped." He even 

 found the rare moon wort — never since observed in 

 Essex — " in the mines of an old brickc-kilne by Col- 

 chester, in the ground of Mr. George Sayer, called 

 Miles' end." The ancient walls of Colchester do not 

 appear to support many rare species. Wallflowers, 

 of course, blossom in abundance as in the days of 

 Gerarde and of Ray. Pellitory-of-the-wall, too, will 

 be noticed in considerable plenty on the Castle keep, 

 together with the beautiful ivy-leaved linaria, and a 

 few plants of the viper's bugloss. Not far from the 

 Castle will be found the stately remains of the once 

 famous Priory of St. Botolph. Vast masses of ivy 



