14 TRANSACTIONS AND PROCEEDINGS OF THE [Sess.lxv. 



but because it may be spoken of as a ' vanishin;^- quantity,' 

 more so, perhaps, in Scotland than elsewhere in the United 

 Kingdom. This arises, doubtless, not from any natural 

 tendency in the plant itself to extinction (though the fact 

 of so large a species being an annual, and not a biennial or 

 still longer-lived, is suggestive of danger), but that, owing 

 to its size and striking appearance when in flower, it 

 becomes a prey to the ruthless thoughtlessness of the human 

 species. A subsidiary cause, no doubt, lies in the fact that 

 its habitat is the narrow fringe of shingly and shifting soil 

 lying between cultivated ground and the sandy seashore, its 

 territory in consequence being liable to be trespassed on by 

 the plough on the one hand and by the waves iroXv^Xola-^oio 

 OaXdacTT)'; on the other. It is thus a child of misfortune, 

 and certainly claims our sympathy and protection. 



Within human memory, the Horned Poppy must have 

 been an object commonly to be met with on the shores 

 of the firths both of Clyde and of Forth, wherever situation 

 permitted. How different is the case to-day ! So far as 

 the counties bordering on the Clyde estuary are concerned, 

 only at two spots, and at these most sparingly, can lingering 

 plants now be seen, viz. on the Island of Bute, within the 

 enclosed shore area at Mount Stuart, and on the Lesser 

 Cumbrae. Botanists, with the true spirit in them, speak 

 with reserve of the spots on those insular regions where 

 Glaucium still blooms. When we turn to the work, pub- 

 lished in 1837, by Hewett Cottrell Watson, dedicated to 

 Sir William Hooker, and entitled " The New Botanist's 

 Guide to the Localities of the Earer Plants of Britain," and 

 look under the head of Dumbartonshire, we find it there 

 stated of Glaucium flavum — " on the shore at Helensburgh, 

 plentifully," — no living botanist, however, whom we know 

 of has ever seen Glaucium there, the inroads of civilisation 

 at that point on the Dumbartonshire coast having been too 

 strong for the plant to battle with. Then, if we turn in 

 the work named to Argyllshire, which is taken as including 

 the adjacent islands from Arran to Mull, we find it said — 

 " Arran, abundant," — but though the writer of this paper 

 and others have worked the Arran coast pretty carefully for 

 many years, Ghmcium has never been met with in that 

 paradise of botanists and other scientific workers. It is 



