1004 



distinct recollection of the time, and a no less misty reminiscence of 

 the place) near Hastings, that being my first residence on returning 

 from a four years' sojourn on the continent, in 1830, when I first 

 turned my attention to botany. The neglecting to examine so curious 

 a "^wo?," if ever found at all, shows that it must have been made in 

 the most inexperienced days of my (botanically speaking) juvenility: 

 so I will not venture to dispute the discovery with my very worthy 

 friend Mr. Borrer, but cheerfully " leave him alone in his glory " to 

 enjoy the satisfaction of adding this to the many other "wild weeds" 

 he has wreathed into chaplets for the brow of our rustic Flora. This 

 grass ranges over the whole of southern and central Europe to the 

 Baltic confines of Germany, and though most prevalent in the deeply 

 continental and warmer parts, is found in the maritime and western 

 countries of France, Belgium, and Holland. In America I remarked 

 it as one of the commonest of grasses in low wet situations, flowering 

 in the central states as early as July or August: there, the panicle is 

 constantly exserted as in Italy, a portion at the base always remaining, 

 I believe, hidden, and which alone it is said ripens seed. My friend 

 the Rev. Dr. Bachman, of Charleston, tells me that Leersia oryzoides 

 furnishes excellent hay, and that many tons are sent from Columbia 

 and other parts of the middle and upper country of Carolina to that 

 city, where it is preferred to the hay made with timothy {Plileiwi 

 pratense), a staple meadow grass all over America. As the cut grass 

 is now known to be a native of England, its growth might be advan- 

 tageously encourged or artificially established in swampy pastures or 

 along the ditches of water meadows, where it would in all likelihood 

 prove to be both permanent and productive. 



Wm. Arnold Bromfield. 



*■ Eastmount, Ryde, Isle of Wigbt, 

 September 26th, 1847. 



Note on Sisyrinchium anceps. By Wm. A. Bromfielu, M.D., F.L.S. 



In the second edition of his valuable ' Manual of British Botany,' 

 Mr. Babington introduces the pretty " blue-eyed grass " of America 

 {Sisyrinchium anceps) as a native of Ireland, without any mark 

 attached to indicate a doubt in his mind of its claim to be so con- 

 sidered. Were I not assured that so cautious and correct a botanist 

 must have good reason for believing a plant foreign to the European 

 flora to be indigenous in its alleged place of growth, I should feel very 

 sceptical on the propriety of admitting it, at least without some such 



