7t)5 



usually labelled " H. boreale." As with " H. rigidum," so also with 

 these; — they are distributed to ask, rather than to give information. 



6. Hieracinni sylvaticum (Sm.) — A few garden specimens of this 

 species are distributed on account of the form under which a second 

 bud is developed in the axillae of the leaves subtending the flowering 

 branches of the stem. A flowering stem has grown from the crown of 

 the plant, in the usual manner, throwing out lateral branches from 

 each leaf or bract of the stem. These have flowered and seeded ; 

 and then, instead of the stem and branches dying away, buds have 

 been formed in the axillae of the leaves, between the leaf and its ax- 

 illary branch. These second buds have developed into young plants. 

 I call them young plants, not branches, because they consist of a clus- 

 ter of leaves, the petioles of which ensheath one another, and the form 

 of which is precisely that of the leaves of seedling plants, or of the 

 early radical leaves, of spring time, upon the older plants. In some 

 of the specimens a fresh, weakly, flowering stem has shot out from the 

 cluster of leaves, precisely like the first flowering stems of small seed- 

 ling plants ; thus completing their resemblance to (or, rather, identity 

 with) young plants, t could dry only few examples, and not all of 

 these so good as might be desired for illustration of the fact indicated. 

 It is one of not very unusual occurrence, I think, but not sufficiently 

 attended to by botanical physiologists. Taken in connexion with 

 other facts, more or less analogous, it points to a general rule ; namely, 

 that when a plant is forced by circumstances to renew its growth in a 

 direction, or at a part from which it would not grow any more under 

 ordinary circumstances, — in such case the renewed growth tends to 

 reproduction, instead of continuation of the individual ; having the 

 characters of infancy, more than those of maturity. This may not be 

 a clear explanation of my notion to others, but to follow it up farther, 

 now, would lead astray from the present object of my Notes. 



7. Sisyrinchium anceps (Lam.) — Mr. Lynam has obligingly sent a 

 number of specimens, from the lately discovered locality " near 

 Woodford, Loughrea, County of Galway." Assuming it to be clearly 

 wild there, the explanation how it got thither will be equally difficult 

 with that which is to be given for the occurrence of Neottia gemmi- 

 para, or Eriocaulon septangulare. What transported them from 

 America to Ireland ? I take the name for granted, without special 

 search into its accuracy. 



8. Luzula nivea (De Cand.) — A few good examples from Dr. 

 Dewar, to whom the Society has been obliged for several valuable do- 

 nations. They are labelled from a " wood at Broomhall, near Dun- 



VoL. II. 5 D 



