272 



overlooked by British writers, and was first pointed out to me by my 

 friend Dr. Wood, of Manchester, but had long before been observed 

 and recorded by Wahlenberg.* Since the above was written I have 

 gathered H. maculatum in the woods and lanes about Clanfield, Au- 

 gust 8, 1848. This certainly coincides with the description given in 

 Babington's Manual of H. maculatum rather than with the same au- 

 thor's diagnosis for H. dubium, the stems being very distinctly quad- 

 rangular, the sepals mostly minutely denticulate, obtuse and submu- 

 cronate, but many of them are also quite entire, and occasionally a 

 little pointed, and vary in shape on the same plant from ovate-ellipti- 

 cal to broadly-elliptical, but hardly at all lanceolate ; the whole ques- 

 tion betwixt this and dubium being purely one of degree, and therefore 

 leading naturally to the inference that both are states of one and the 

 same plant. 



Hypericum perforatum. In great abundance all over the county 

 and Isle of Wight, in almost every soil and situation. Of this we 

 have two well-marked forms or varieties, if their extreme phases alone 

 be regarded, but to which limits are unassignable. 1st. The narrow- 

 leaved variety, H. perforatum, fi.angusttfolium,Ga.ud. &c, H.veronense 

 of Schrank, the leaves of which are narrowly elongate-oblongf or many 

 times longer than broad. This form is common in certain parts of the 

 Isle of Wight, both in open places and in woods, more usually the 

 former. For further remarks on this variety see ' Phytologist,' vol. i. 

 p. 461. 2nd. The broad-leaved form, H. perforatum, y. latifolium, 

 Gaud., distinguished by the greater size and breadth of the" leaves, par- 

 ticularly of those on the main stem, where they are truly and broadly 

 ovate, often an inch to an inch and a half in length. This state of the 

 plant is usually to be seen in woods and under hedges, sometimes in 



* Fl. Suecica, 1st edition, 1826, ii. p. 476. 



f I use the terms elongate-oblong, elongate-k\nceo\a,te, elongate-eUivticsil, to imply 

 an oblong, lanceolate or elliptical superficies, drawn out or produced with straight 

 sides, assuming the curve proper to each figure at the extremities only. I would 

 instance as an example of the second the leaves of Epilobium angusti folium, or of 

 Salix fragilis. The phrase, which long since occurred to me, and which I have con- 

 stantly used in MS., though I know not what claim I can lay to its invention, strikes 

 me as more precise and correct than the term linear, which as employed in botanical 

 language is widely different from the idea commonly entertained of a linear object, or 

 one whose dimensions approach much nearer at least to the mathematical definition 

 of a line, " length without breadth." The addition of " narrowly " or " very nar- 

 rowly " to the above epithet describes gradations of contraction in width fully as well, 

 if not better than to talk of " narrowly or very narrowly linear," whilst the incorrect- 

 ness of a glaring pleonasm is avoided. 



