in the Neighbourhood of Edinburgh. 177 
now directed to the daily disclosures of the quarry, we may ex- 
pect that, in the course of time, a list of the various genera and 
species of plants discovered in this interesting locality will be 
perfected. 
NOTES TO SECTION III, 
Fossil Botany is a subject of inquiry so beset with difficulties, as to demand an 
almost exclusive attention to it by the naturalist, if he would pursue it with success 
For this reason, I should be unwilling to commit myself by any attempts to treat of 
the Fossil Flora of Burdiehouse more in detail ; nor can such attempts be reasonably 
expected in a memoir so limited as this must necessarily be. Specimens of the more 
important plants, among which are some new ones already discovered, have been 
transmitted, not only from the collection made by the Royal Society of Edinburgh, 
but likewise from my own cabinet, to Messrs Linptey and Hurrton, to be described 
by them in their important work exclusively devoted to the Fossil Flora of Great 
Britain. Other specimens, though from my own private collection only, have been 
sent to M. Adolphe Brongniart, whose acquaintance I had many years ago the hap- 
piness of forming in Edinburgh, while he was prosecuting his important researches 
in Fossil Botany: and thus every opportunity has been afforded for having proper 
justice rendered to the plants of more peculiar interest which have already turned 
up; and, in reference to future disclosures from the quarry, other similar transmis- 
sions are meditated. 
Hitherto, two plants only from the vegetable remains of Burdiehouse have been 
noticed, which were forwarded to Professor Linptrey and Mr Horton, for their 
Fossil Flora, by their zealous and very intelligent correspondent Mr WirHam. In 
the botanical description given of the Sphenopteris bifida, it is incidentally stated, 
(see vol. i. of the work, p. 147), that “ the plant was communicated by Mr Wiraam, 
from the mountain limestone of the lime-quarries of Burdiehouse, near Edinburgh ;” 
and, upon another occasien, a similar acknowledgment is rendered. 
In the absence of any geological description whatever having been hitherto pub- 
lished of this limestone, the very name of Burdiehouse would have been unrecorded, 
if it had not been for this incidental circumstance. 
I am given to understand, that it is intended to devote the whole of a very early 
number of the British Flora to an elucidation of the plants of Burdiehouse. 
In reference to this anticipation, as well as to the chief object of this memoir, 
which is to illustrate the fresh-water character of the limestone of Burdiehouse, one 
plate only has been dedicated to its Fossil Flora. 
Fig. 1. of Plate VI. is the Sphenopteris bifida. 
Fig. 2. is a plant, unfortunately not in the most perfect state, which Iam in- 
clined to consider as an undescribed Sphenopteris. But, as I agree with 
Mr Horton of Newcastle, in the possibility that the specimen may be 
“VOL, XIII, PART I. © Z 
