July 1898.] BOTANICAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH 117 



(jiiite hardy, with free branching dwarf habits of growth, 

 and almost perpetual flowering. Many of them are 

 also very fragrant. 



Astragalus alpinus albus. By Egbert Lindsay. 



(Read 14th July 1898.) 



Astragalus alpinus is one of the rarest and most beauti- 

 ful of our Scottish Alpine plants. Previous to 1884, there 

 were only two stations known in Scotland where it was to 

 be found — one at Little Craigendal, in Aberdeenshire, the 

 other at the head of Glen Doll, Clova, in Forfarshire. A 

 third station was discovered by Mr. Patrick Neill Fraser in 

 September 1884, on Ben Yrackie, a mountain near Pit- 

 lochry, in Perthshire, and it was at this station where the 

 white variety that I now exhibit was found. It is very 

 remarkable how Astragalus alpinus was so long overlooked 

 on so popular a mountain as Ben Vrackie, as from its 

 abundance at this station the plant must have been 

 growing there for a very long period. The rocks, for a 

 considerable distance, are quite covered with Astragalus, 

 and among the debris at the foot of the rocks, the herbage 

 consists almost entirely of Astragalus alpinus, which in 

 places forms a carpet as smooth as a bowling-green, pro- 

 bably by the plant being cropped and eaten by sheep. 



It was here, at the foot of the rocks, that I dug up a 

 few plants to grow, at the end of June 1896. I searched 

 the rocks higher up, and obtained a few flowering specimens, 

 but they were all typical alpinus, and I had no idea that 

 the plants I dug up were anything different from the 

 ordinary type till they came into flower a few weeks ago, 

 and I was not a little surprised to find two or three 

 separate patches of a white variety intermixed with the 

 ordinary pale blue form. The plants are now forming an 

 abundance of seed. 



There is in cultivation, and has been for a long time, a 

 white variety of Astragalus hypoglottis, but how it originated 

 I know not. There is no record, so far as I know, of a 

 white variety of Astragalus alpinus having been known to 

 exist previously, and I therefore submit it to the Society. 



