120 ON AN OPENING IN SOME LEGUMES. 
L. spinulosa, irem —Withy-bed east of Tresco Pool. 
L. dilatata, Pres/.—Common in 8t. Mary's Marshes ; Tresco, near the Pool. 
Athyrium Filis mo mina, Roth. — Common in, St. Mary's Marshes; also in 
resco. 
Asplenium marinum, Z.—Most wine on the rocks and walls, and in the 
wells, viec all the island 
Adiantum-nigrum, L.— Occasionally ; near Heugh Town, on the wall opposite 
to where Scrophularia Soorodosia occurs; walls leading from Holy Vale 
to Heugh Town, etc. 
Scolopendrium vulgare, Sym.—Bank near Old Town Marsh. 
Pteris aquilina, Z.—Very abundant, covering the slopes in all the islands. 
Osmunda regalis, Z c d in Heugh Town and Old Town Marshes, also 
west of pae 
GEA See a L., B. ambiguum, Len and Germ. (‘Flore des En- 
e Paris,’ ed. 2, p- 577).—This, which I at first referred to O. Lusi- 
ilm. L., occurs most abundantly on the heights of St. Agnes, to the 
north-east, and to within a veg Sn ance of the shore. The following 
characters are from fresh.specim i 
Plant from 1-24 inches high. sa pee nd ovate or ovate-lanceolate, atte- 
nuate below, channelled, recurved; fertile frond with 12-20 s 
Rhizome extensively creeping ; two fertile fronds often springing from the 
same corm. Spores minutely tubercular. 
The plant creeps — AR " the fronds thickly stud the ground. 
In one place I co ted.as many as.102 fronds in a square foot. It grows 
, in very barren ar exposed damp bandy ground, with a substratum of de- 
composed granite. Fruiting in June. 
ON AN OPENING IN SOME LEGUMES. 
By A. H. Cuuncu, Esq., F.C.S. 
In some experiments recently made to determine the amount of water 
contained in the ripe seeds of Faba vulgaris, a phenomenon of peculiar 
interest was noticed. A number of the pods of this plant were ex- 
amined at various stages of growth. It was found that the perfectly 
mature pod lost weight previous to dehiscence, and that this loss was 
due in part to the evaporation of water from the seed. Further expe- 
riments showed, in fact, that the ripe seeds might lose, even in the pod, 
one-third as much water as similar seeds lost when removed from tlie 
pod and exposed to the air for the same time. This loss of water is of 
course accompanied by a corresponding decrease in bulk, so that the 
seeds which when first ripe filled up almost entirely the cavity of the 
