32 TRANSACTIONS AND PROCEEDINGS OF THE [Sess. lv. 



Professor Bayley Balfour communicated the substance 

 of a letter from Professor Gairduer of Glasgow, in which he 

 stated that he had been much interested in certain state- 

 ments of the Eev. Dr William Allman of Kilmacrenan, 

 Donegal, made to him some years ago regarding Digitalis. 

 He had invited Dr Allman to make a note of his observa- 

 tions, and the following communication regarding the plant 

 had reached Professor Gairdner : — "As to the Digitalis, what I 

 told you rested solely on my own observation, and is as 

 follows : — Hereabouts, and from this on to Creeslough, there 

 is plenty of Foxglove ; from thence on to beyond Dunfan- 

 aghy, none at all (about which there can be no mistake, as I 

 lived in the latter place for nearly sixteen years, and here 

 for seventeen) ; the only way for accounting for which is, of 

 course, the nature of the soil, that in this neighbourhood (apart 

 from the boulder-clay) being formed chiefly of disintegrated 

 quartzite of gneiss. Whereas, from that on, there is plenty of 

 limestone, and the other rock is chiefly mica-schist." . . . 

 " The quartzite continues on past Creeslough, and therefore the 

 absence of the" Foxglove is caused by the presence of the 

 limestone. Indeed, I recollect having read in some botanical 

 work that lime is inimical to Digitalis, and to some other 

 indigenous plant, whose name I forget ; but I made the 

 observation myself very many years previously." 



In the vicinity of Edinburgh, so far as the experience of 

 members present went, the Foxglove is found in abundance 

 chiefly on decomposed igneous rocks. ■^'" 



Dr J. M. Macfarlane made the following communica- 

 tion : — The following extracts from a long and graphic letter 

 lately received by me from Mr J. Graham Kerr will be read 



* Thurmann (Essai de Physostatique, ii. 169) speaks of Digitalis purpurea 

 as a plant diininishiiig in regions where the rocks are dysgeogenous {i.e., 

 do not readily form a soil), and as being affected by the mechanical con- 

 dition more than by the chemical. At the same time, he points out that 

 it is absent from many lime soils. Contejean (Ann. Sc. Nat, ser. 6. ii. 

 (1875), 301) includes it amongst plants which can propagate on calcareous 

 soils, but less vigorously than on soils deprived of lime. Professor Bower 

 jwints out that TJigitalis is comparatively scarce, if not entirely absent from, 

 the magnesian limestone of Yorkshire, while it is present on the grit. (Note 

 added in the Press). 



