521 



bloom in May in ordinary years, excepting R. nigrum, which extends 

 a little into that month.* 



In conclusion, I may state that I regard both R. nigrum and R. 

 grossularia as being genuine natives of the Isle of Wight. The for- 

 mer, though rare, is found in several of our deep, boggy woods, which 

 produce some other northern species abundantly, as Epilobium an- 

 gustifolium (the long-podded, ciisped-leaved form, with small, deep- 

 coloured flowers, a common Hampshire and Sussex plant), Ruhus 

 Id<eus (raspberry), Viola palustris, Myrica Gale, Equisetum sylvati- 

 cum, &c., and in rotten, swampy thickets, where the soil and atmo- 

 sphere are still more cold and humid than that in which the red 

 currant delights ; whilst R. grossularia occurs frequently but spora- 

 dically everywhere, both in the open and woodland, high and low 

 districts, in the clefts of rocky dells and the deepest recesses of our 

 remaining ancient forest ground. 



Wm. Arnold Bromfield. 



Ryde, Isle of Wight, April, 1846. 



Notice of ' The Vegetable Kingdom ; or the Structure, Classification, 

 and uses of Plants, illustrated upon the Natural System.^ By 

 John Lindley, Ph. D., &c. With upwards of Jive hundred 

 illustrations. 



Of this most voluminous volume it has been remarked by a cotem- 

 poraiy of high authority, " it is not too much to say that none more 

 important to the student of Botany has ever appeared, for to the pro- 



* The flowering season of plants, as given in our ordinary and popular Floras, re- 

 quires careful revision, being lamentably incorrect in numberless instances. The pe- 

 riods assigned are for the most part too limited or contracted, as an example of which 

 I shall adduce Pulmonaria angustifolia, which is said to flower in May and June. 

 Now on the cold, stiflf clay about Ryde, where the species abounds, it is always in 

 flower by the middle of March, and sometimes at the close of February ; it is in high- 

 est perfection of bloom by the middle of April; in May half the plants are out of 

 blow, and any one who should visit its localities in June, with a view of obtaining 

 good flowering specimens, would experience some difficulty in finding one in the con- 

 dition required. So again, Cyperus longus flowers in August and September, or even 

 till later, not in July, as the books inform us. The continental writers are more ex- 

 act than ourselves in this point, so important to the young or inexperienced collector, 

 who is always prone to go by the letter, and to suppose naturally that when June is 

 given as the flowering season for a species it would be in vain to seek it in May or 

 July. Mr. Babington, in his excellent Manual, has done much towards correcting 

 these inaccuracies of his predecessors. 



