474 



facts observed by Mr. Andrews had been published in the report of 

 the meeting of the London Botanical Society, of April 4, 1846 (Phy- 

 tol. ii. 537 ; Gard. Chron. 1846, p. 254), at which he proved, by the 

 exhibition of a series of specimens, that " the fact of the Hibernian 

 forms including those of the Pyrenees is placed beyond all doubt or 

 cavil," I never suspected that I was bound to write a paper upon the 

 subject, nor that any charge could be brought against me, even by 

 your correspondent " C", for not going out of my way to publish 

 those facts which Mr. Andrews was so well qualified to publish him- 

 self, and indeed had published. I supposed that all the interest of 

 the subject was at an end after Mr. Andrews' discovery of the Pyre- 

 nean forms of the Pvobertsonian Saxifrages in Ireland, as that interest 

 consisted in their supposed absence. 



In answer' to a letter from me, I am informed by Dr. Harvey that 

 Mr. Andrews thinks that I prevented the publication of part of his 

 remarks in the Reports of the British Association, and also of a paper 

 sent to the ' Annals of Natural History ' by him. 



With the publication of the former I had nothing to do, as the lo- 

 cal officers of the Association are not consulted upon such matters, 

 and have no hand even in transmitting the papers, communicated to 

 the sections, to head quarters. The report was probably drawn up 

 by one of the Secretaries of the section, to whom abstracts of papers 

 ought to be given by their authors. Had that been done in this case, 

 the report would have been such as Mr. Andrews wished. 



Concerning the paper sent to be inserted in the Annals I know 

 nothing, as it is not usual for the Editors of that Journal to submit 

 papers, reflecting upon, or contradicting the statements of, one of 

 their own body, to the person upon whom the reflections are made. 

 I therefore did not see it, and know nothing about it. I feel certain 

 that a short statement would have been printed. 



After what had appeared in the 'Phytologist' (Phytol. ii. 537), I 

 thought that I had done all that was requisite by adding, in the 2nd 

 edition of my Manual (p. 126), which was published in 1847, to the 

 account of Saxifraga umbrosa the words " All the forms are found in 

 the west of Ireland," thus including amongst those found in Ireland 

 the a. crenata, which was stated in the 1st edition to be the Pyrenean 

 plant. 



What I stated " so positively " in the Annals was, that having had 

 occasion to re-examine the Irish Saxifrages, I had been "greatly 

 struck by the uniform difference which exists between each of them 

 and the corresponding plant of the Pyrenees." In this, all that 



