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say, I came close upon it. Yea, when its snow-white starry petals 

 are fully expanded to meet the rays of the cheering sun, the distance 

 of a few short yards is sufficient to secure it from the searching eyes 

 of the exploring botanist, at which time it is a most pleasing object, 

 well calculated, when found, to arrest our zeal whilst we stop to con- 

 template its delicate whiteness ere we destroy the same by stooping 

 to gather it for our herbarium. 



Not so in spring; it is then quite a conspicuous object in localities 

 where it grows, being at this period of the year much the tallest and 

 of a very different green from the surrounding grass, when a kind of 

 trigonometrical survey should be made, and bearings of the precise spot 

 with some particular objects obtained and the exact distance there- 

 from noted down, which would not only prevent disappointment at 

 the time for collecting it, but also injury to the mowing grass in 

 searching for it ; and doubtless such a process may be applicable to 

 the finding of other plants of humble growth which are conspicuous 

 in the spring, when they are little thought of, but are hid from our 

 longing eyes and itching fingers by the over-growth of surrounding 

 objects as the summer advances, when they are eagerly sought after 

 but cannot be found from the causes before enumerated, which the 

 above observations may in some measure, it is hoped, tend to obviate. 



George Reece. 



Worcester, October, 1848. 



Remarks on the " Rubus leucostachys" of Lindley, Leighton ( Flor. 

 Shrops.J, and Lees, and " Rubus niiidus" of Bab in g ton and 

 Leigh-tort's Fasciculus. By Edwin Lees, Esq., F.L.S. 



The Rev. W. A. Leighton, in his elucidatory ' Notes on Shropshire 

 Rubi,' in the ' Phytologist,' states, under R. leucostachys (Phytol. iii. 

 175), that "R. leucostachys of Lees in Steele's Hand-Book is, accord- 

 ing to specimens from Mr. Lees, identical with R. nitidus of Bab. 

 Syn. and the ' Fasciculus of Shropshire Rubi.' " With a suggestive 

 modesty which I wish all botanical writers would try to imitate, as 

 well as come up to his investigating ardour, my untiring friend does 

 not say with bramble-like asperity that I have blundered, in the mat- 

 ter, but implies that my conclusions are probably wrong, as being dif- 

 ferent from those of Mr. Babington. 



I have almost come to the resolution to take no authority in bota- 

 VOL. III. 3 A 



