335 



the supplementary plates sent with that edition. The volume which 

 should include the figure, has been lost from the Linnean Society, 

 where there appears no haste to replace it. The character and syno- 

 nyms of this plant are correctly given in the fifth edition of the ' Bri- 

 tish Flora,' except that the spikes are said to be " drooping," which I 

 do not find to be the case. The description in Babington's Manual 

 is also correct, or nearly so. As in allied species, the stamens vary 

 in number ; but I think that six (not five) is the usual number ; one 

 close on each side the ovary, and four others in an outer whorl. The 

 " spikes thickening upwards " I do not quite understand. 



I have collected P. mite along the gravelly margin of the Thames, 

 Surrey side, between Walton bridge and Sunbury lock ; more espe- 

 cially near the bridge, where Lord Tankerville's lawn runs alongside 

 the river. It occurs also in a ditch, at the entrance of the first (short) 

 lane on the right hand, in passing along the road from Hampton 

 Court bridge towards the South-western Railway. I have likewise a 

 fi*agment, apparently of the same species, though in a young state, 

 firom the neighbourhood of Southampton. Cheshire specimens are in 

 the herbarium of Sir W. J. Hooker, sent by Mr. W. Wilson, under 

 the name of P. minus, (1828). I have also European specimens of 

 the same species, sent with the names of laxiflorum (Weihe), dubiura 

 (Braun), Braunii (Bluff and Fing.), and mite (Pers.). With the excep- 

 tion of the last, these names may be taken for synonyms of our Eng- 

 lish P. mite (Schrank). Persoon apparently intended the American 

 species, which is not the same as the European one (previously .?) 

 named " mite " by Schrank. It is difficult to say whether Allioni's 

 figure and description of P. strictura belong to mite or minus. Ber- 

 toloni, with specimens from Piedmont before him, refers them to P. 

 minus of ' English Botany.' 



It should be mentioned that a specimen of the Walton-bridge plant 

 was last year communicated to an eminent English botanist, whom I 

 supposed to be well acquainted with P. mite of the * British Flora ' 

 and ' Manual of British Botan3\' He referred my plant to P. minus, 

 considering it to be the form which Fries has called P. strictum, and 

 with which he unites our P. minus as a smaller variety. After re-ex- 

 amining the Walton plant this year, together with Persicaria and 

 minus, all in a fresh state, I find myself unable to concur with the 

 botanical friend alluded to. I refer my plant unhesitatingly to the 

 species received as P. laxiflorum, from botanists of Prussia and 



