22 PROCEEDINGS COTTESWOLD CLUB 1912 



HALF-DAY EXCURSION TO CLEEVE HILL, Near CHELTENHAM. 

 Saturday, June ist, 1912. 



Director: Charles Bailey, M.Sc, F.L.S. 

 (Report by Charles Bailey). 



This excursion was, by kind invitation of Mr Charles Bailey, to 

 Haymesgarth, Cleeve Hill. Those present were: — Mr William Crooke, 

 F.A.I. (Deputy-President), Mr W. R. Carles, C.M.G., F.L.S. (Vice-President), 

 Mr J. H. Jones (Hon. Treasurer), Dep. Surg.-Gen. G. A. Watson, Lieut. - 

 Col. T. H. Sweeny, Messrs J. M. Collett, S. J. Coley, G. M. Currie, Charles 

 Curtis, William Bellows, J. M. Dixon, G. Emhrev, F.C.S., O. H. Fowler, J. 

 H. Garrett, F.L.S., B. G. Geidt, E. Hartland, j'. N. Hobbs, H. H. Knight, 

 E. Lawrence, A. M. McAldowie, F.R.S.E., .\. S. Montgomrev, F. J. Mylius, 

 H. E. Norris, W. J. Stanton, A. J. Stephens, E. T. Wilson, etc. [L.R.] 



The object of the excursion was to inspect the Herbarium, which has 

 been removed from Manchester and St. .\nne's-on-the-Sea to Cleeve Hill, 

 and which is ultimately to come into the possession of the \'ictoria Univer- 

 sity, Manchester. It has been in the course of formation during the last 

 fifty years, and is of considerable range and extent. 



The Members were in the first instance taken round the garden, where 

 attention was drawn to the more interesting native plants growing therein, 

 including the following: — Sisymhrium strictissimum, Linn., from Heaton 

 Mersey ; Tutiica Saxijraga. Scop., from Tenby ; Saponaria officinalis, Linn., 

 from Southport ; Sileiie duhia, Herbich, from Thirst Hou.se Cave, near 

 Buxton ; Geranium syb-aticum, Linn., from Forres ; Geum iutertjiedium, Ehrh., 

 from Millersdalc ; I'eucedanitm Ostriithium, Koch, from Bolton ; Hieracium 

 amplexicaiile, Linn., from Saltburn ; Symphytum tuberosum, Linn., from 

 Melrose; Symphytum peregriiuim, Ledeb., from Grange Mill, Derbyshire — a 

 species which is now growing on the south side of Southam de la Bere ; 

 Anchusa sempervirens, Linn., from Kircudbright : and Carex peudula. Huds., 

 from Laverton, some of which plants have established themselves in Great 

 Britain in recent years. 



.\mongst the plants growing in the garden are many self-sown examples 

 of Lamarck's Evening-primrose (Qinothera Lamarkiatia. Seringe). The 

 parent plants were originally brought to Cleeve Hill from the estuary of the 

 Ribble, on the Lancashire coast, and although the soil of the neighbourhood 

 is so unsuitable for a sand-loving species, it has continued to maintain itself 

 on the Hill ; the species is biennial, and all the plants now in evidence are 

 last year's seedlings. Mr Bailey had been acquainted with the Lancashire 

 plant for more than thirty years, but he did not know its true name until 

 about si.x years ago ; botanists had been accepting it as a large-flowered 

 form of GE. biennis, to which Aiton's name of grandiflora was usually applied. 



The special interest attaching to (E. Lamarkiana is that the investiga- 

 tions of De Vries have established the fact that from this plant originate 

 descendants, with groups of characters which show considerable diversities 

 from the plants which produced them. The lines of descent do not follow 

 each other in slow or imperceptible variations, but they make decided de- 

 partures from the parent stock ; to these discontinuous variations De Vries 

 has given the name of " mutants." The original plant is presumed to have 

 been grown in the flower-beds of the Paris botanical gardens in 1788, but to 

 this day no one has succeeded in re-finding its native station in North 

 America, whence it was derived. The various American herbaria have also 

 been searched for native examples of the plant and for indications of its 



