THE ORDEAL BEAN OF CALABAR. 239 
Another frond in Mr. Rowbotham’s possession is rather larger, having 
a total length of about twenty-two inches, Mr. Rowbotham describes 
the habitat as agreeing in all its circumstances with those referred to 
in my Fern-books, and the plant as only varying from the figure in the 
octavo * Nature-Printed British Ferns,’ in being of larger growth. “I 
found it,” he writes, “in a large hole formed by fallen rocks alongside 
a cascade of water; and admission to this hole, which is about five 
-feet high by four feet wide, is obstructed after a depth of about three 
feet by this Fern falling from the rocks at the top, and growing out of 
the sides in the form of a beautiful curtain, down which the water is 
constantly trickling; the whole having much the appearance of a erystal 
screen.” What a treat to a Fern-seeker, to stumble on such a sight as 
this! So unwilling was the finder to disturb the singular and beauti- 
ful effect, that he took with him only an offshoot or two from the prin- 
cipal network of rhizomes, “ out of which the innumerable fronds were 
projected." To so much, as the discoverer, he was fairly entitled, but 
it will be a sacrilegious hand that does aught beyond this, to destroy 
so unexpected a habitat for so rare a plant. 
Mr. John Field mentions in the ‘Gardeners’ Chronicle ' of July 11th, 
a rumour that Williams, the late guide, had planted in the Snowdon 
district Irish specimens of the Trichomanes, but even if so, this would 
hardly account for the luxuriant and well-established condition in 
which Mr. Rowbotham found it. E 
THE ORDEAL BEAN OF CALABAR (PHISOSTIGMA FE- 
NENOSUM, Balf), AND THE BEST METHODS OF AF 
PLYING IT IN OPHTHALMIC MEDICINE. 
Bx DANIEL HANBURY, ESQ., F.L.S. 
The recent experiments of Drs. Argyll Robertson, Fraser, and Stewart, 
aud of Messrs. Bowman, Wells, and others on the Ordeal Bean of 
Calabar* and the fact elicited by these experiments that it possesses 
the peculiar power of causing the sphincter pupille and ciliary muscle 
to contract, render it probable that this remarkable seed will find a 
* Edinburgh Medical Journ. March 1863; ‘ Modica) Time: and Gazette,’ 
p é F; 
. 
16 May, 1863 ; also Seemann’s * Journal of Botany,’ i. p. 
