79S 



(called, in Hants, Wood or Copse Laurel) is collected in large quan- 

 tities from the woods in Sussex, by persons who go at certain periods 

 round the country for that purpose, and bring it to the markets of 

 Portsmouth and Chichester, where it is sold as a horse-medicine, but 

 he was unable to ascertain for what diseases it was employed, — pro- 

 bably as an epispastic, from its great acrimony. I have known it so 

 collected in this island. The pulp of the ovoid, black berries is per- 

 fectly bland, as in the Mezereon, but the seed in both is intensely 

 acrimonious. Passerina annua, not rare in the extreme north of 

 France, may possibly be found hereafter in the south-east of England. 

 Thesium humifusum [T. linophyllum). On chalky banks, downs, 

 and dry, open pastures, more commonly in high than in low situations. 

 Very frequent in the Isle of Wight. On Ashey Down, and elsewhere 

 near Brading. Plentiful in the Lentenfield Pit, by Carisbrook. On 

 grassy slopes between the woods in the valley near Rowledge, pretty 

 plentifully. On chalky banks facing the sea at Ventnor ; Miss G. E. 

 Kilderbee !!! Common on the downs about Ventnor; Dr. G. A. Mar- 

 tin !!! Near the Lighthouse, Freshwater Down ; Rev. G. E. Smith !!! 

 Chalk cliff on the south side of the Isle of Wight ; Dr. Stokes in 

 With. Bot. An - . Spit at Norton ; Banks near Colwell ; Brading Down. 

 Afton and Freshwater Downs, in great abundance ; Mr. W. D. Snooke, 

 Fl. Vect. !!! Not, I believe, unfrequent in mainland Hants, but ex- 

 cept in a station I shall speak of presently, I have never seen it off the 

 chalk. I feel pretty certain of having seen it on St. Catherine's Hill, 

 Winton. Once found on some high downs between Old Alresford and 

 Stratton, 1828 ; Mr. Wm. Pamplin in New Bot. Guide. Flower 

 Down, near Winchester. Basingstoke ; Martyn (Bot. Guide.) Main- 

 dell chalkpit ; Mr. W. L. Notcutt ! Itchen Stoke ; Miss L. Legge : 

 and doubtless very widely dispersed over the whole cretaceous sys- 

 tem. On the short, close turf of our high downs the Thesium is ex- 

 tremely dwarfed and diminutive, and its habit of growth not well dis- 

 played ; but in lower, more sheltered places — as on grassy banks and 

 chalk slopes — it acquires a very large size, and the copiously branched 

 stems spread in all directions on the ground, or sometimes in a fan- 

 shaped manner, to the extent occasionally of eighteen inches or more; 

 when growing amongst taller plants, erect or ascending at their ex- 

 tremities. This prostrate form, which is particularly fine on the slop- 

 ing sea-banks in Ventnor Cove, I have long been accustomed to re- 

 gard as probably the T. linophyllum, var. j8. humifusum, of Duby's 

 ' Synopsis,' the T. humifusum of De Candolle's ' Flore Fran^aise,' and 

 which Mr. Babington has adopted in the ' Manual ' for the T. lino- 



