. 691 



flowers deeper yellow. In copses occasionally. In a copse betwixt 

 Shanklin and Bonchurch I found in April last two roots of this va- 

 riety. The copse was full of primroses, but not a single cowslip was 

 to be seen on or near the spot, the leaves were truly those of the 

 primrose, and excepting in the umbellate flowers and their somewhat 

 deeper colour, the plants differed in nothing from the ordinary prim- 

 roses which grew around them. In this form we perceive the first 

 approach to the cowslip structure, of which it possesses two of the 

 attributes, the umbelled arrangement of the peduncles, and deeper 

 tinted corolla. It is, in fact, the stepping-stone from the simple prim- 

 rose to the var. /3. of the following species (P. veris). Under cultiva- 

 tion, and occasionally in the wild state, the primrose sends up a 

 single erect stem various in height, bearing an umbel of reddish or 

 brown-edged, often richly-coloured flowers, the well-known Polyan- 

 thus of our borders, with all its beautiful, but endless varieties. The 

 flowers of the wild polyanthus primrose are usually liver-coloured, as 

 we see them become in poor or neglected garden soil. This form of 

 the primrose I have gathered in Sussex (near Hastings), but have not 

 met with it in the Isle of Wight myself, although it has occurred here 

 to Mr. Albert Hambrough. At no season, perhaps, is the primrose 

 wholly out of bloom in this county, unless during the latter summer 

 and earlier autumn months ; for, as it is the last flower of spring to 

 retire at the approach of fervid summer's gayer throng, — 



pale primroses 



That die unmarried ere they can behold 

 Bright Phoebus in his strength, — 



so is it the first returning to await in hopeful anticipation through the 

 waning year's long and dull decline, the brighter days that follow on 

 the birth of the next. A bunch of primroses on New Year's morn is 

 a gift, from the mildness of our winters of late, hardly more thought 

 of as a rarity than a nosegay of spring daffodils or a bouquet of sweet 

 violets at Lady day. 



Primula veris. In meadows, pastures, w T oods, on dry banks, chalky 

 slopes and downs ; more local than the primrose, but abundantly 

 distributed over the entire county and Isle of Wight. Rarely seen 

 about Ryde ; in fields near Quarr Abbey and the Spencer road, spar- 

 ingly. Frequent about Brading and Yaverland, in fields at Ashey, 

 Nunwell, &c. About Shanklin, Newchurch and Appuldurcombe. 

 About Carisbrook Castle on the walls and glacis. Very common 



