125 



which seems to promise a fine field for a natu- 

 ralist. It took me up two hours walking from the 

 foot to the top of it. I found the Andromeda Da- 

 boecia * growing in great abundance on the sides of 

 the mountains ; the Empetrum nigrum, and some 

 other plants which were new to me, and not being 

 in flower I could not determine them ; and within 

 a few yards of the top, the Saxifraga umbrosa, the 

 London Pride, not in Hudson. If any one should 

 wish for any plants of the Andromeda Dabcecia, I 

 could send him plenty. I hope this summer to 



* Figured in the first volume of English Botany, p. 35, under 

 the name of Erica Dabeoci, Irish Heath. This genus is now re- 

 moved to Menziesia by Jussieu and Swartz. See English Botany, 

 vol. xxxv. p. 2469. 



The following letter to Sir J. E. Smith, from R. Duppa, Esq. 

 of Lincoln's Inn, dated July 1827, may here furnish a note re- 

 specting this genus. 



Dear Sir, — Somewhere or other I think I have met with an 

 assertion that there was but one Heath indigenous to Ireland, and 

 that is now removed to the genus Dabcecia '. My question is, 

 whether, of the four species of English Heath, any one is found 

 wild in Ireland ? and also, if our English Heaths are not found in 

 Ireland, whether the bogs of Ireland are composed of the roots of 

 the Dabcecia, the Salix herbacea, or what ? 



The Erica vagans is peculiar to Cornwall. — Query, are the 

 Erica vulgaris, cernua and Tetralix found in Cornwall as well as 

 the vagans ? and is the Dabcecia, which is peculiar to Ireland, 

 never found in any other country that we are acquainted with ? 



R. Duppa. 



1 Mr. Duppa probably meant Menziesia ; there is no genus 

 Dabcecia. The plant was called Andromeda Dabcecia in Linn. 

 Syst. Veg. It is named Dabeoci after St. Dabeoc, whence the 

 Linnaean trivial name has been corruptly taken. 



