305 



where forests have been consumed by fire, and the timber totally de- 

 stroyed, if the ground be afterwards left to itself, there springs up 

 from seed a growth of forest trees of an entirely different kind from 

 those which had preceded it, as, e. g., pine after oak, or vice versa, I 

 quite forget the particulars, and that this fact is so certain, and so 

 well known to the inhabitants, that they can calculate to a nicety 

 what description of timber trees will spring up in this or that forest 

 after the present growth shall have been destroyed by fire. I cannot 

 vouch for the truth of these things, but I have seen them narrated 

 as grave and sober statements of matters of fact. 



I hope it will not be thought that I have entered into this long, 

 and, I fear, very tedious discussion, merely in my own defence, as it 

 were, and with a view to screen myself from any obloquy which may 

 seem to attach to one who has overlooked a plant on ground over 

 which he has repeatedly botanized. The truth is not so. In the 

 case of Ranunculus Lingua, a far more conspicuous plant than the lit- 

 tle dwarfish fern in question, and one therefore which ought still less 

 to escape detection, I have pleaded guilty, to the fullest extent, and 

 confessed the defectiveness of my own botanical researches. But as 

 regards the Botrychium on Coleshill Heath, I must say it is strange 

 that it never should have been found either by Mr. Thickins or by 

 myself until this season, if it has grown there in equal abundance 

 for many former years. Mr. Bloxam's case, too, may possibly fall 

 nearly within the same category, though he may not be able to allege 

 a conflagration in aid of his defence. Perhaps, therefore, Botrychium 

 Lunaria might with no great impropriety be added to Epipactis lati- 

 folia, Orobanche major and Poly podium Dryopteris as examples of 

 plants 



" Sponte sua quae se tollunt in luminis auras.'' 



W. T. Bree. 



Allesley Rectory, August 15, 1848. 



Occurrence of Filago apiculata near Great Braxted, Essex. 

 By G. E. Varenne, Esq. 



In a gravel-pit at Great Braxted, in this county, there are to be 

 found specimens of Filago apiculata, which are now coming into mil 

 flower. The locality is not confined to the gravel-pit, the middle of 



