CORRESPONDENCE. 187 



Corrcsponiciia. 



Protective Resemblanxe. — While botauising receutly in the New 

 Forest, Hampshire, with Mr. Bolton King and Mr. G. Stapleton, we 

 noticed on the head of the meadow thistle, Cardinis pratensis, a common 

 skipper, which did not tiy on our near approach, and seemed rather 

 mysteriously fastened to it. Closer examination revealed the cause : 

 a spider had seized it by its head, and its bite had already paralysed 

 it. The curious fact is that the spider was exactly of the same colour 

 as the thistle head, and its legs most ditiicult to distinguish from the 

 florets. Through Professor Westwood's kindness, I am enabled to say 

 that the spider's name is Thomisas ahhreviatm, the peculiar colour and 

 its six eyes, with the strange-shaped abdomen, making it a rather 

 extraordinary creature. The colour is described as normally of a pale 

 yellow — can it be chameleon like, the colour depending upon its home, 

 which, in this case, was of most " protective resemblance." — G. C. 

 Deuce, F.L.S., Oxford. 



Edelweiss. — Last week I saw four or five plants of the " Edelweiss," 

 growing, and growing well, in a garden near Arnold, in Sherwood 

 Forest. They were brought over by the owner some four years siuce, 

 but did not show until the hrst of the last hard winters, when they 

 caine up, and are now fine plants. Facing east on a rockery border to 

 a garden walk, they have every appearance of living well. — Hy. D. 

 Cromptox, 1st July, 1882. 



[The plant is growing and thriving on a rockery at Moseley, near 

 Birmingham, aspect the same — east. — Eds. M.N.] 



SiLEXE ANGLic.\. Liiui. — I have recently found Silene anglica 

 growing abundantly in a sandy field near Coleshill. Here I believe the 

 plant is a native plant, as the field in question has never been under 

 cultivation ; so that I now consider the plant native and not alien, as 

 I formerly thought. In the stations mentioned in my notes on the 

 Flora of Warwickshire, the plant is undoubtedly of foreign origin, of 

 uncertain occurrence, and in the Sutton Park Station not truly 

 established. — J. E. Bagn.vll. 



Warwickshire Gisasses. — In June last, I found an abundant growth 

 of two comparatively rare Warwickshire grasses, viz., Avena pratensis 

 and Kueleria cvistata, near Hampton-in-Arden. This is the first time 

 either of these grasses has been recorded for North Warwickshire. I 

 have seen both in several localities belonging to what I have termed 

 the Avon basin district, but have sought both in vain, until receutly, in 

 the Tame basin district. — J. E. Bagnall. 



DicKANUM JioNTANCM. — Siiicc I last iioticed this moss as a Warwick- 

 shire plant in the " Midland Naturalist," Vol. iv., page 116, 1 have made 

 a special point of collecting any moss that I found growing near the roots 

 of oak trees, in woods, that boi'e any outward resemblance to this moss. 

 I have invariably found that all the mosses I collected near the roots 

 of oaks were Dicranum montanum, whilst those collected high up the 

 trunk have most frequently been Weissia cirrliata. In my former note 

 I mentioned the characteristic differences between these plants, and 

 need not here repeat them. By this minuter inspection of the likely 

 habitats for Dicranum montanum, I have been able materially to increase 

 my knowledge of its occurrence in Warwickshire, so that in addition to 



