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On the Flowering of British Plants. 

 By Isaiah W. N. Keys, Esq. 



January, 1849. Season very mild. Early in the month, saw 

 primroses which had been gathered by some pedestrians who had 

 availed themselves of the fine weather for a country walk. Noticed 

 several young dandies who are fond of carrying " flowers in their waist- 

 coats " pranked with snowdrops. In the latter part of the month, an 

 old water-cress woman called at my door, having her basket of salad 

 fringed with white scented violets. She had brought them into the 

 town for sale. I did not inquire of the old woman where she pro- 

 cured her violets ; but doubtless they were pulled from some hedge. 

 The white variety of Viola odorata is, however, very common here in 

 the little garden plots of peasants. Query, were not many of the 

 plants now considered questionably indigenous, on account of their 

 being found in gardens and near dwellings, once truly wild ; having 

 been (for some property of use or ornament which they possess) re- 

 moved, by the invading hand of man, from their native haunts to the 

 spots which they now inhabit ? It may be remarked that most of the 

 plants against which the mark of dubiety is fixed, are either of lovely 

 form or agreeable odour, or are invested with poetical interest. 



February 11. Weather very fine. Ranunculus Ficaria in bloom 

 sparingly. Salix unfolding its catkins. In the garden, white violets 

 perfuming the air. 



February 13. Fine day ; mild. Found, during my walk, an outer 

 coat an incumbrance. Noticed the following plants in bloom : — 

 Draba verna : minute specimens, on an old wall near the town. 

 Thlaspi Bursa-pastoris, Senecio vulgaris, Bellis perennis, and Ta- 

 raxacum officinale, by the road-side and in waste places. Ranuncu- 

 lus Ficaria was plentiful on the road-side of Chelson Meadow and 

 elsewhere. In the usual habitats in Saltram Woods, Galanthus niva- 

 lis. Lychnis dioica, in the wood ; only one plant : this must have 

 been a veteran of the past summer. Vinca major sparingly in flower, 

 and V. minor abundantly so, all along the banks and pathways 

 through Saltram. Mercurialis perennis. Narcissus Pseudo-narcis- 

 sus was in full bud — in some cases on the point of bursting into 

 flower. Gathered two or three small specimens of Viola canina. 

 Met with only one primrose. In the hedge on the Plympton road 

 saw four plants of Potentilla fragariastrum in flower. Cardamine hir- 

 suta was whitening the hedges with its tiny petals ; and in many in- 

 VOL. III. 4 A 



